Cyberchase: The Androidian Revolution
by Grand High Idol
Summary: [REUPLOADED] An unwanted discovery of Buzz, Delete, and Digit's blueprints leads to a great scientific error, in which a great evil must be stopped...even if it takes the teamwork of good and bad to do it...
1. Prologue

**Prologue**

"So, are you really sure that you're going to be fine, Inez?" Jackie asked her friend, sitting on the bed where Inez was lying. Inez looked slightly pale, had several char marks on her body, and had a thick bandage wrapped around her still aching head. She appeared to be recovering just fine, but her condition gave Jackie every right to worry, especially since after what had happened just a few hours earlier.

"Yes, Jackie," Inez told her, sounding weak. "I'll be just fine…you guys can go ahead and sleep now."

"It's a good thing that we're still allowed to spend the night," Matt said in relief. "Whether you're recovering or not, Nezzie, we're still worried about your health."

"I told you, Matt," Inez said, sounding slightly annoyed, "I'll be just fine—" she coughed slightly—"And don't call me Nezzie, okay, Matt?"

Matt, noticing his mistake, nodded his head quickly and said, "Oh, right! Sorry about that, Inez…it won't happen again."

"It better not," Inez sighed; then she lay her head back down on her bed and said, "Now, let's just try to get some sleep before day breaks, okay guys?"

Jackie and Matt sighed, then nodded and went over to their sleeping bags on the other end of the room. Inez sighed and turned over on her back, looking up at the ceiling of her bedroom. After what had happened in cyberspace earlier, she was lucky to even be in here now, let alone have only a few injuries. The others in cyberspace were in an even worse condition than she was…

She continued to stare up at the ceiling, all sorts of thoughts rushing through her head; she had drowned out all sound, including Matt and Jackie's steady breathing from the other end of the room. What had started as an innocent sleepover at her house had become an intense chain of events that sooner or later led to them becoming the saviors of all cyberspace for eons to come.

She sighed, then looked toward the open window. With it being the middle of summer, a warm breeze was blowing through, rustling the curtains. She continued to run through the past events; thousands of questions popped into her mind as she did…

Finally, she could take it no longer. Sitting up at once, ignoring the pain from her burns, she reached toward her beside table and grabbed the pen resting on it, then, taking some paper up from the floor, started to write:

_If you are reading this, you know not the events of the past. I have made my confession that I, indeed, am a traveler and savior of cyberspace. But I am not the only savior…I have two special friends, Matt and Jackie, that have helped me through this turmoil and horrid chain of events. Without them, I would not have made it._

_But they weren't the only ones that helped me. Besides them, I now confess that I have cyberspace friends as well—there's my bird friend Digit, of course, and Motherboard, and Dr. Marbles. However, after this event I did what I thought I could not do. I befriended the two who had before been my mortal enemies…I finally saw their true colors, not the way they usually acted…I never understood before, but I guess that now I finally do._

_I don't know why he saved me. I don't know why he chose to protect me. Perhaps he was dead tired of holding back on his chances. Perhaps he just decided that I chose to live, not to be crushed or killed. He almost killed himself in the process, but he's going to live, thank goodness. His brothers were injured as well, though not as bad as he was after what he chose to do._

_I myself am pleased with them—all three of them. I'm proud with them finally putting the past behind them and accepting each other. I'm proud with them for finally discovering their true selves. I'm proud with them for taking the risks of suffering and death, and fighting to protect what they loved most. They suffered a few consequences, but they've finally settled it. They'll hurt each other no longer; they'll insult each other no longer; they'll leave the past events behind and finally accept the fact that they're brothers, all of them._

_I now realize just what has happened around there, and why it had happened in the first place. We are now all closer together, with the possible exception of Hacker…he just doesn't seem to like anyone. Well, that's his loss, I suppose. Even after his team-up with the Doc, he still can't seem to accept anything…I suppose when you're an evil genius once, you're an evil genius for all time._

_And what's queer is, we have no one or nothing to thank for this. I was only informed of this…it all started with the theft of some confidential blueprints…_

She yawned silently as sleep finally began to overtake her. Setting the pen back on the beside table, she slipped the paper under her bed, then removed her glasses and set them next to the pen. She then took one last look at the open window, into the night, before she finally drifted into a dreamless slumber…


	2. Part I

**CYBERCHASE: THE ANDROIDIAN REVOLUTION**

**By Grand High Idol **

**Disclaimer: I do not own Cyberchase, nor any of its characters. **

**CHAPTER ONE**

**Northern Frontier, 8:58 a.m.**

The incident itself, however, occurred hours earlier, but the roots of that incident trace back to what seemed like another normal morning at the Northern Frontier, one of the dreariest places in cyberspace. Normally at this time Hacker would be out wreaking havoc at another distant cybersite, but surprisingly this time he wasn't planning on destroying anything. Being one to always keep his workspace clean, he was now doing exactly that to the main control room.

"Filth," he muttered angrily to himself as he cleaned off the control panel. "Aren't those dead-brain duncebuckets aware that they create more of a mess than those bratty kids! If those two get this place any dirtier, _I'll_—"

"Morning, Boss!"

Still peeved, he turned his head toward the source of the interruption and saw Buzz and Delete, sure enough, walking out of one of the hallways that led to the main control room. Buzz looked like he had seen better days, and Delete was his usual giddy self; it was certain that they had just woken up. Delete had been the one that had said good morning to his boss, but Hacker was unfazed by this cheerful remark.

"What are you two doing up so late?" Hacker growled at them as they took their seats at the table in the center of the room. Buzz groggily rested his head in his hand, while Delete picked up a magazine that was resting on the table and started to read it…well, in the best way that he could, anyway. Delete looked up from the magazine shortly after and made his response.

"But boss, it's only nine a.m.—"

"Don't sass back at me!" Hacker snapped at the robot. Delete cowered back and hid his face behind the magazine, his gaze still locked on his boss, while Buzz opened one eye, then closed it shortly after and let out a tired sigh as Hacker continued: "I have been fed up with all of this filth lying around us…thus, I am making a proposal to rid the entire area of filth, dirtiness, and anything in other words that is not acceptable by me. Of course, I am certainly not going to do each and every thing by myself, so _you two_ are going to clean the entire area surrounding the Grim Wreaker…and I want you done by noon today."

Buzz groaned, then said weakly, as he was still half asleep at the moment, "Boss, don't you know how big an area 'dat is…?"

"_NOW_!" Hacker shouted angrily at the two, which startled them both so much that they nearly fell out of their seats. This appeared to serve as the perfect wake up call for Buzz; he had now snapped out of it and was wide-awake. Not wanting to disturb his boss anymore, he quickly jumped down from the chair and bolted off toward the doorway that led outside; Delete pulled the magazine he had been reading off of his head (it had come to be there when he was startled), then quickly left after his brother. Hacker growled in frustration, then resumed to his cleaning of the control panel.

Buzz and Delete, meanwhile, quickly ran through the door that led to the sliding platform, each shoving the other in order to get out the door first. Buzz succeeded, of course, sending Delete onto his side as he ran down the platform triumphantly. Delete made an annoyed noise, then got back on his feet and brushed the dust off of himself. He then looked angrily at Buzz.

"You didn't need to push me that hard!" he snapped angrily. Buzz turned his gaze toward the ceiling, apparently trying to ignore him, and walked over toward the nearest pile of overturned boxes that were scattered throughout the entire lair. Delete huffed; he apparently knew that Buzz was ignoring him as well, and instead of starting an argument walked down the remainder of the platform to where Buzz was currently standing.

"Can you believe 'dis?" Buzz asked his brother, holding his hands out at the piles of scattered boxes that lay before them. He then thrust his hands angrily to his sides as he continued, sounding vexed, "I mean, really…how many supplies do we go 'troo a year?"

Delete stared at the tremendous pile of boxes, then looked up toward the ceiling and innocently played with his hands for a while. Buzz growled, seeing that he was not planning on answering anytime soon, then walked up to the nearest box and grabbed the top flap with both hands. He then pulled on it, but considering his size and weight this wasn't going very well. In frustration, he turned to his younger brother.

"I can't get 'dis…Dee-Dee, I could use a little help, here!" he said annoyedly. Delete at once snapped out of the far-off trance he had been in and, shaking his head a few times, quickly walked over to where Buzz was and stood to attention, waiting for his order. Buzz gave the box another sharp tug, then said, "Get to 'da opposite side…if you push it it'll move a bit easier."

Delete smiled and nodded, then quickly stationed himself on the other side of the box and slammed his side into it. However, he had done so a bit too hard, and instead of merely moving an inch or two the entire thing came crashing down. The two seemed greatly surprised; Delete stood with his hands over his mouth while Buzz, meanwhile, finally emerged from under the collapsed object, coughing a blue streak, possibly from the dust, Delete guessed. He then turned to face Delete, a look of great vexation on his face now.

"I said push it, not ram it!" he shouted angrily.

Delete, taken aback, cowered a bit, then came to his senses and spoke his reply. "Sorry, Buzz, but it looked too heavy at the time to simply push…"

"Yeah, yeah, sure," Buzz said, a trace of sarcasm in his voice. He pushed himself up, then brushed the dust off of himself and started to pick up one of the smaller boxes; that was when he stepped on something. Puzzled, he lifted his foot up and bent down to pick up the object, now revealed to be a rather crumpled piece of paper. He looked around, then shrugged it off and stared at it.

"What did you find, Buzzy?" Delete asked curiously, leaning over to read the print. The paper had been newly made, it was easy to tell, and the printing was done in very exquisite type. There were strips of tape on the edges, but it was old and poorly stuck; he decided that it must've fallen off the wall when the boxes tipped over. (This was actually quite common; it had happened a few times before. People were always trespassing and taping notices to the walls…)

"I dunno…but it looks like an invitation or something…" Buzz stared at the paper some more, then finally rolled it up and turned to face him. "We have to show 'dis to 'da boss! Come on!"

He ran back toward the platform. Delete, his face set in a look of confusion, stared after him, then sighed and followed suite. When he reached the platform door, Buzz had already approached Hacker, who was now sitting in his chair and eyeing a map of cyberspace. When he saw them enter, he turned his gaze up to them, then narrowed his eyes. "Aren't you two supposed to be cleaning up the filth outside?"

"Well…uh…yeah, we were, but I was—I mean, uh, Delete was—" Buzz appeared to be at a slight loss for words. He finally sighed, then unrolled the paper he had in his hand and held it up to Hacker's face. "I think 'dis is for you, boss."

Hacker cocked his eyebrow, then snatched the paper from his assistant's hands, smoothed it out, and looked at it. After a few moments of scanning the paper, he finally muttered, "It's a notice for the Annual Evil Convention tonight…"

"Ooh! What's that?" Delete asked, stepping up behind Buzz.

"That, my dim-bulb duncebuckets, is one of the most exquisite conventions in all of cyberspace," Hacker informed them, sounding calmer, yet the trace of annoyance remained in his voice. "Every year or so, all of the acceptable evil geniuses in cyberspace gather there to discuss matters of taking over cybersites. Of course, I am one of them, seeing that I am the most ingenious of them all…"

"So are you going, boss?" Buzz asked.

"Yeah, are you going?" Delete repeated.

Hacker shot them a vexed gaze, then turned his eyes back down on the paper, skimmed the type some more, and finally said, getting up and saying in a peeved tone to them: "Of course I'm going! You can't have a convention for the most evil geniuses in cyberspace without the pick of the litter being there, can you?" He tossed the paper on the control panel nearest him, then turned around and started to walk toward the door that led to the hallway. "You two had best get ready…I'm not leaving you alone with the Grim Wreaker again."

After he had gone, Buzz cocked his eyebrow in confusion and picked the paper up from the control panel as Delete clapped his hands and said giddily, "Did you hear that, Buzz? We get to go to a fancy party! One of the fanciest in cyberspace!"

"Yeah…" Buzz was still eyeing the document curiously. "Why haven't we been informed of 'dis until just now, though? It happened so quickly 'dat it's just ridiculous…"

Delete shrugged his shoulder. Buzz sighed, then tossed the paper aside and said, abruptly changing the subject, "Well, if we're going, we can expect to be dolled up like goody-goodies…I just hope it's for a good reason this ti—"

"I'm back, boys!" Hacker called as he entered through the doorway. Sure enough, he was wearing one of his most exquisite outfits, the exact same one that he had worn in his (unsuccessful) party to proclaim him ruler of cyberspace. He was carrying a gold tipped cane in one hand, and several clothing items in the other hand. These items he thrust into both the hands of Buzz and Delete.

"Now get ready!" he snapped at them, adjusting his bow tie. "I'm not letting you two go to a fancy party without the proper garments. In the meantime, I myself am going to transport us there in time for the greetings…"

He walked off. Buzz sighed, then dropped the items on the floor and said to Delete, "See, what did I tell yas?"

"Oh, come on, Buzz," Delete said, pulling on a fancy black jacket. "It probably won't be that bad…"

"What do you know?" Buzz scoffed.

* * *

**Annual Evil Convention, 8:07 p.m.**

As dusk fell, Hacker, Buzz and Delete, now appropriately dressed, stood at the entrance to the fancy building that the convention was being held at. Hacker was facing his two henchmen, his back to the people who passed him, as he tightly gripped his gold cane in one hand and hissed at them, "Listen, you duncebuckets, this event only happens once a year, and I want to make a good impression. You two must strictly be on your finest behavior, and if I catch you doing otherwise I shall personally make sure that you are _both_ beaten into the dust. Do I make myself clear?"

"Oh, yeah, boss! Crystal clear!" Delete said, nodding. "Right, Buzz?" He nudged Buzz, who was on the brink of humiliation in the silk hat and gloves that he was wearing, in the side with his shoe. Buzz growled at him, then, realizing what he meant, nodded his head at once.

"Sure, boss! We'll be on the best behavior possible!" he said quickly. Hacker cocked his eyebrow, then turned around, tossed his head back, and strode into the building. Buzz and Delete stared after him, then slowly and carefully followed him through the entrance.

As Hacker entered, he at once grinned and tugged on the sides of his jacket, as the other villains who were familiar with him walked up and said their greetings. Buzz and Delete stood by, taking great caution not to utter a word, as their boss and the other unknown villains shook hands, then left. No one bothered to shake hands or say "hi" to them; however, they had been ignored many times before and were used to it by now. Instead they just stared at the many rows of booths that had been installed inside the building until Hacker finally finished his greetings, then headed off to a different area.

The two robots obediently followed their boss as other evil geniuses that hadn't yet introduced themselves to him gave their greetings, shook hands, and made several comments such as "I've seen you on Cyberwide Television several times" or "that's a fancy outfit. Did you manage to swipe the silk from a thrift store?" These greetings usually lasted at least two or three minutes, so it was easy for one to grow restless, especially when they were just standing around.

They got their moment of relief at long last when their greetings finally brought them to the gold doors of the ballroom; the building that the convention was being held at this year apparently took place in some kind of exquisite club gathering center. Hacker, of course, entered through the doors, with the two robots close behind, and they soon found themselves among many dancing and conversing couples (evil, naturally). Delete stared at the dancers in awe; Buzz, however, was more interested in what was at the nearby buffet table.

"Delete!" he hissed, nudging his brother in the shin with his arm. The taller robot stopped staring and looked down at the stumpy one, a questionable gaze on his face.

"Yeah, Buzz?"

"Come on!" Buzz demanded, walking over toward the desired location, and grabbing Delete by the extension cord he had attached to his back as he did so. Delete still looked slightly confused, but followed Buzz over to the table, where he stood as his brother helped himself to some punch. He then leaned against the table as Hacker arrived on the scene, then adjusted his top hat and casually placed one elbow against the tablecloth.

"Say, boss, is this what these evil people do all throughout the convention?" Delete asked, thinking of the question from the top of his head. Hacker stared at him with the same vexed gaze he always had for a moment, then turned his head up toward the dancing crowd and muttered under his breath:

"Only if you have proper etiquette are you sophisticated…"

Delete cocked his eyebrow in confusion; he didn't know if Hacker was answering his question or not, and had just opened his mouth to ask what exactly that meant when he heard a shrill, not to mention highly familiar, voice calling from the other end of the table:

"Oh, Hackie-poo!"

At hearing these words, Hacker turned up his head in the direction where the voice had come from; Buzz and Delete did the same. At the end of the table they saw, sure enough, the Wicked Witch, clothed in garments as sophisticated as Hacker's or anyone's, for that matter. As soon as she was sure that she had caught Hacker's attention, she casually walked over and leaned over on the table next to him.

"Hello, Wicked," Hacker responded blandly, locking his gaze on hers. Wicked grinned slightly, then placed her hand on his. Buzz made a disgusted face, while Delete broke into a small grin.

"Hackie, I've been here for nearly hours and I'm now in the mood for dancing. And of course you can't have a dance without someone to share the romance with," Wicked sang, placing her hand on his shoulder.

Hacker stared at her for a few moments, as he often always did in these situations, then finally smiled and said casually, "You've got yourself a date, my lady."

At these words, Buzz snorted into his punch, while Delete broke out into a fit of giggles. Hacker shot a warning glare at the two, and Delete, sensing the annoyance, tried his best to stifle himself. Buzz sighed and wiped the punch off of his face while Hacker and Wicked departed onto the dance floor. Delete watched them, a dreamy look now on his face, while Buzz was apparently getting more disgusted at this scene by the moment.

"Can you believe 'dat?" Buzz asked Delete, finishing off his punch. "I thought 'dat 'dis was supposed to be an evil convention, not a romance convention!"

"Aw, I think it's cute," Delete said dreamily, staring at the two with his hands clasped tightly together. Buzz stared at him, then looked out on the dance floor, then finally slapped his hand to his face and grabbed Delete by the arm. He then started to pull him away from the buffet table.

"Come on, Delete, we're leaving 'dis joint. I don't think 'dat I can stand any more of 'dis stuff," he exclaimed. Delete looked a bit taken aback, but followed Buzz anyway, once he had regained his balance from the sudden jerk Buzz gave him, that is. They quietly left the ballroom and entered the main area of the convention once more, which was still immensely crowded.

"Wow," Delete exclaimed as they pushed their way through the crowd, "I never noticed that this place was so…well, big."

"You never notice anything the foist time," Buzz told him. "Let's find something worth looking at in here, shall we?"

"Buzz, I don't even know where we are now," Delete told him. "How are we supposed to find anything if we don't know where anything is?"

"We'll ask someone here for directions, duh," Buzz snapped at him. He pointed to the booth nearest him, where a tall, thin man was standing behind a rather large booth surrounded by inanimate robot types. "We'll start by asking 'dat guy. Come on, Dee-Dee."

Delete sighed wearily, then followed Buzz over to the front of the booth, where the man, now revealed to be a scientist of some sort, was leaning over on the booth, his arms crossed in a bored manner; he appeared to be staring at them. In closer view, the two could now see that he was rather thin, and had age lines on his cheeks. His chin was covered by a brown goatee, with a light mustache to match. He had scraggly brown hair and hands that were as bony as his face, and his skin was so pale that he looked almost as white as the lab coat he was currently wearing. He looked more like a regular human than a cybercitizen; it would be hard for anyone to tell the difference in him.

"Can I help you two?" he asked, in a rather frustrated voice. And he had every right to be frustrated, too, for he was a scientist of robotics and currently was set on the goal to build the ultimate fighting machine; ordinary battlebots just weren't good enough for him anymore. He desired more power, more flexibility, and more intellect than the ordinary battlers…he wanted something different. However, he wasn't having much luck; he had observed every single type of robot that the guests had brought, and yet they didn't have what he was looking for. This deeply frustrated him.

"Uh, yeah, we're new here and we need—" Delete began, but he was cut off by the man suddenly snapping out of his boredom trance, causing the table he was resting at to give a violent jerk. He shut his mouth as the man finally cast eyes upon what he had been talking to, and his eyes were wide with anticipation. Delete nervously bit his lip and started to back up, but the man held up his hand, halting him.

"Oh, no, no, never mind me," he said, the tone of frustration now entirely gone from his voice. "Do go on…I'm _quite_ interested in what you have to say."

Delete still looked a bit uneasy, but he cleared his throat and continued his question. "We could really use some directions, mister—YIPE!"

He shrieked in surprise as the man suddenly shot out and grabbed him by the arm, then pulled him nearer to the booth and, holding the nervous robot's arm straight, slowly ran his eyes over it, as if examining it. He then started to feel it with his fingers, then looked at Delete and asked, "You appear quite flexible. Were you created this way?"

Delete responded with a frightened whimper. Buzz sighed and rolled his eyes; he was used to Delete's little fits of terror, and replied to the man plainly, "Yes. We was both created to be as human as possible, despite our appearances. 'Dere's nothing a human can do 'dat we can't do as well."

"I see…" The man released his hold on Delete's arm and rubbed his goatee in thought. He then asked yet another question: "Are you two quick on your feet as well?"

Delete was starting to recover from his moment of fear and surprise, so it was he who spoke the reply this time. Rubbing his arm, he explained, "Yes…we can both reach the speed of a car in about five seconds or something. I was made to run faster than Buzz, though…"

The man nodded; he seemed to be deeply absorbed in their appearance. Both robots weren't at all sure what to think of this; they didn't know if they could trust him or not, so they continued to answer whatever he had to ask them. This went double for Delete, who was easily frightened and wasn't very good with strangers.

"Very good, very good…" The man smiled and nodded, then rubbed his goatee again and said, smiling down at the two, "Now, just one more question for you two, and I'll let you go off to do whatever it is that you wanted to do…" He paused for a moment, as if deep in thought, then finally said, in a sly manner, "What are your robot types exactly? I just need to know in case I ever want to look anything up…" He then grinned innocently, showing most of his teeth.

This was indeed a very personal question; neither Buzz nor Delete knew what exactly their type was. Buzz knew better than to blurt and kept silent, but Delete, of course, always ended up spilling the secrets one way or another.

He had just opened his mouth to say something when a large green hand slammed into him, connecting with his chest and knocking him out of the way. He fell to the floor, landing hard on his back and knocking the wind out of him, then looked up just in time to see Hacker, who had apparently finished his little dance with Wicked and was now standing in front of the booth, an angered look set on his face as he shot the man behind it an ugly leer.

"Can I help you, sir?" the man asked casually, leaning against the booth and folding his hands together in a calm notion.

Hacker gritted his teeth, then said in a tone to match that of his glare, "Yes…what were you saying to my henchmen just now, dare I ask?"

"Your henchmen?" The man blinked, then turned to look at Buzz and Delete, who still lay sprawled out on the floor. He then looked at the creator of the two and said, in a mellow tone, "So, you're their creator, I presume. Well, I'm a man of robotics and I am highly interested in your two…uh, creations. Would you mind telling me how you came to build them like that?"

"Absolutely not!" Hacker snapped back, slamming his fist down on the booth table with incredible force. He then stared the man straight in the eye and hissed, through clenched teeth, "Those two are my own personal creations. They are the only ones of their kind to be created to this date. Revealing such information as that you requested would be strictly against my beliefs." He paused as the man stared at him in surprise, then said warningly, "That information is top-secret, you meddling marauder. It's not meant to be viewed by the eyes of any mere mortal." He uttered the last word in a growling tone; the man looked at him with a mix of surprise and questionability.

"My sincerest apologies, sir," the man said after a few moments, a sly grin now creeping up on his face. "I only meant for it to be for scientific purposes. But if the information is that important, I shall withdraw my request immediately."

"That's more like it," Hacker replied. He then turned to his two henchmen and snapped, heading off to another part of the convention, "Come on, you duncebuckets, it appears that I have some unfinished business to take care of…"

The two robots quickly got to their feet and ran off after their boss; the man desperately bit his lip as they departed. He had finally gotten the chance to find the perfect robot type for the ultimate fighting machine…but if the information was that secret, he guessed that it was going to be pretty hard to get his hands on. Then again, that man was the Hacker, after all; there was no evil genius in cyberspace that hadn't heard of him. They knew nearly everything about him…what his past evil plans had been, what his mortal enemies were, how he had come so close to defeating Motherboard several times…they even knew where he lived…

At unearthing this fact, he stopped biting his lip and broke out into another sly grin. Casually crossing his arms over the table booth yet again, he stopped the next person to cross it and said, in a tone as calm as his stare, "I beg your pardon, sir, but do you know much about The Hacker?"

The person—now revealed to be a rather tall man—stifled a laugh, then said, "Know much about him? Heck yeah. I can tell you the radius of his vehicle if you wanted me to."

The man smiled and nodded, then continued, "That won't be necessary at this moment. I do, however, need to know one little tidbit about him…do you know precisely where he lives at the moment?"

The other man thought for a moment, then finally nodded and said, "Rumors have it that he's currently residing at the Northern Frontier…you know, that drab place just north of Topsy Turvey Island. You can't miss it once you get there; it's the only landmark in the area for miles. Why do you need to know?"

"Oh, no reason," the man replied innocently, though his face certainly didn't show it. The other man looked at him for a moment, then shrugged it off and walked away from the booth. As soon as he had gone, however, the man cackled to himself, then said, "There could be a way for my plan to come through after all…prepare to be invaded, _Hacker_…"

* * *

**Northern Frontier, 12:46 a.m.**

It was now pitch black in the lair of The Hacker, which proved as an advantage for any type of thief that might have wanted to try and sneak into the area. This particular night, however, it was the man, desperate to know more about Buzz and Delete, that played the intruder. His car, used for transportation to the area, was parked and well hidden behind the stacks of collapsed boxes, and the figure himself was seen swiftly running across the tiled floor over to the sliding platform of the Grim Wreaker; it was always kept open when they weren't going anywhere.

Ducking behind a nearby trashcan cautiously, the man scanned the landscape, then, now quite sure that there was no living soul in sight, slowly pulled himself up onto the side of the platform and, getting down on his stomach, slowly inched his way upward, barely breathing or making any sound whatsoever. He continued to do this until he came to the sliding door; checking it over he could now see that it was tightly locked.

This was no surprise for him; he knew that the door would be locked and had come prepared. Reaching into his coat pocket, he slowly took out a metal cutter and quietly clanged it against the door. He then turned it in a circular motion, making a slightly loud _SCREECK_ sound as it sliced into the metal. He cringed, then looked toward the door; no one appeared to be coming. It looked like he was in the clear for now.

Emitting a sigh of relief, he slowly removed the metal cutter from the door and pushed on the precut circle that he had created. It popped out of the door instantly and clattered to the floor; he cringed again, then cautiously stuck his head inside the hole and looked around.

The room that the door led to was pitch dark, the most he could see were the silhouettes of the items kept in the area. Sucking in a deep breath, he crept through the hole and immediately flattened himself on the floor, then glanced around again. There was no one coming, nor was there anyone in the room. _They must be asleep_, he thought, then his face cracked into that maniacal grin once more.

Drawing himself up to full height, he looked around again, then slowly trod across the room over to the hallway that led to where their rooms were located. At first he had just considered abducting them in their sleep and cutting them open to find out how their different parts functioned, but right as he was standing in the doorway he realized that with robots, there _was_ an easier way. Grinning again, he looked over in the direction of the control panel, then slid his gaze over to the file cabinet on the opposite side of the room.

Quietly heading over in that area, he slowly slid open the top file drawer and thumbed through the different files kept in there. When he could find nothing, he sighed, then bent down a little and opened the file drawer below that one. He thumbed through these files in the exact same way he had used with the first drawer, but still he could find nothing of what he was looking for. Grunting in frustration, he squatted down and opened the third file drawer, then thumbed through the files again, this time more slowly as so not to miss anything.

"Oh, for the love of God," he muttered to himself as he thumbed through the many different folders kept in the drawer. "Where in cyberspace does he plan on keeping his—AHA!"

He exclaimed this last word as he finally found what he had been looking for. Lifting the folder out of the cabinet, he gripped it tightly in his hands, as if it were some sort of precious item, then held it up to one of the green-tinted windows, his only source of light in the entire room. The folder looked plain enough, but the fold at the top was imprinted with words, in Hacker's fancy handwriting:

Experimental Blueprints 

Below that was the main part of the folder, which, as the man had predicted, had the word _Confidential_ stamped on it in bright red ink. He grinned and hugged it close to him; if the blueprints were this precious to Hacker, imagine what they would be to him, a lowly robotics scientist...

He then out of curiosity flipped open the folder, revealing the blueprints inside. He fingered through them carefully; sure enough, he saw Buzz and Delete's blueprints, but what really surprised him was that there was another blueprint mixed in with them. Puzzled, he took it out of the folder, taking care not to rip or tear it in any way, and held it up in the beam of moonlight from the Grim Wreaker window. What he saw were the blueprints and instructions for some type of new robot…one he hadn't seen before. It paid some striking similarities to a bird, but in other ways it looked more like a storage box. He turned it sideways, thinking that this was just another instructional guide for Buzz or Delete, then flipped it back in its correct position and, finding out once and for all that it wasn't another guide, smiled in satisfaction and surprise.

"Well, I'll be downed…there's a _third_ one?" he said gleefully. "This is perfect…this is just too perfect…"

He placed it back in the folder, then quickly closed it and started to head back toward the hole that he had cut into the door. Grinning, he slipped through the hole, then grabbed the metal circle that he had cut out and fit it back in, then used a device that had been kept in his pocket along with the metal cutter to seal it back up.

As soon as it was thoroughly sealed, the man grinned, then got to his feet and tucked the blueprint folder tightly under his arm. He headed back down the platform, then, before going behind the boxes to retrieve his vehicle, turned around and gave a sarcastic salute to the towering ship in front of him.

"Many thanks, Hacker," he said mockingly, a slight laugh in his voice. "Many thanks…"

He then cackled to himself as he slunk behind the pile of boxes, the folder still tucked tightly under his arm, then, after a few moments of silence, the silhouette of a small cyber-vehicle emerged from behind them, and stole off into the dead night…


	3. Part II

**CYBERCHASE: THE ANDROIDIAN REVOLUTION**

**CHAPTER TWO**

It was early morning when the man arrived back to his own lair, a rather large science lab next to an electrical factory that ran the entire area, which, considering the fact that the lab took up three fourths of the cybersite, wasn't that much. However, the lab ran on very advanced technology and needed a lot to fully power it; the people working at the plant were scientists as well and made sure that the power was kept running at all times.

Carefully steering the car past the large electric fence that guarded the lab, he slowly brought it to ground level and drove it through a tunnel in the side of the large white building that served as their laboratory. The tunnel led to a small docking area, where he gracefully landed the car, then opened the side door and got out, the blueprint folder still under his arm. Walking across the platform at the end of the tunnel, he stopped in front of a space-style door and, reaching his fingers out, pressed a button adjacent to it.

After a few silent moments, the door finally emitted a loud beeping sound, then slid open. The man tugged on the side of his coat with his free hand, then slowly and casually walked down a brightly lit, narrow hallway to a series of doors on either side. Choosing the third door from his left, he reached out and pressed yet another button, then waited for the door to slide open.

As soon as it did what the man had desired, the giddiness of a child instantly possessed him. He bolted through the doorway and ran down yet another plain-looking hall, until he finally came out of the area and found himself in a rather small room. It contained almost nothing inside it, if you didn't count the table, desk, and chairs that were positioned inside. The room itself was located right next to a balcony; if you looked below you could see the metal floor of the experimental laboratory. A group of four or five scientists were seated around the table, looking down at a pile of paperwork; they looked up as soon as the man entered.

"Well?" the nearest scientist, a woman, asked, leaning over on her seat. "How was the convention, John? Did you get any help with what you were looking for?"

"Oh, yes," the man (John) replied, his lips curling up into yet another smile. "_Lots_."

"Okay, spill it, John," the scientist seated next to the woman commanded. "What did you find? Are you eligible to show us?"

John nodded, the sly grin still on his face, then walked over to the table and took his seat at the head. He then brought the folder out from under his arm, whipped out the blueprints, and slammed them down on the table, provoking the surprise of everyone seated there. When the shock had cleared, the scientists curiously eyed the blueprints, looks of confusion, triumph, and surprise on their faces. The scientist seated nearest to John slowly reached out and picked up Digit's blueprint, then examined it and said, lowering the precious item and looking at him, "John, I've never seen these types before. They look almost like they were made by someone who didn't want to share his creations with the world…"

"He didn't," John replied, snatching the blueprint away from him and setting it next to Buzz and Delete's blueprints. "I managed to snatch these blueprints from one of the most evil geniuses in cyberspace…the Hacker. He's the role model of almost every evil cyberspace genius there is. I even got a look at his ready made creations, and I'm telling you they're perfect."

"You…you stole these from Hacker? _The_ actual Hacker?" the next scientist, an elderly man, said in awe, pointing to the blueprints. John nodded; he seemed greatly pleased with himself for doing so.

"I'm telling you, with these things we can create the new age of battlers!" he exclaimed, clenching his hand into a tight fist to strengthen this remark. "We just need to put a few hours of work into it, and I'm sure that we'll finally triumph at long last!" He took a deep breath, then said, in a calmer tone, "So, do all of you agree upon this?"

The other scientists seated around the table merely stared at him, apparently lost for words, until finally the man next to him spoke up. "I suppose that we could give it a go, John. After all, these are only experimental, and we've got nothing left to lose considering our previous experiments..." He turned to the other scientists and said, placing his hands on top of each other, "What do you say we give it a go?"

The other scientists remained silent but responded either way by nodding their heads; they looked rather like a group of bobble-head dolls. John smiled, then picked up the blueprints and tapped the ends of the papers on the table to align them.

"Very well, then," he said, stuffing the blueprints back into the folder. "I shall start building the prototype tonight. In the meantime, I need all of you to help in the preparation for the testing of these new creations…cages, arenas, new combat enemies, the whole deal. And I want it done within a time period of two or three days."

"John, you can't be serious," the elderly scientist said to him, shaking his head in disbelief. "Two or three days? What makes you think that you can design a prototype that quickly? It took us weeks just to build our previous battler, and even then it failed to meet our standards…"

"You've forgotten, my good man, that I am a highly advanced robotics scientist," John pointed out. "In our quest to accomplish our goal, I have gained much experience with robotic technology and I can assure you that I can put together the actual creation within a week, maybe even earlier if I truly put my time and sweat into it." He paused, then said, standing up from the table, "Besides, I have seen the actual living creations and I can assure you as well that their designs were as simple as simple can get…no extra built in weaponry to slow things down or get in the way. I will, however, make a few adjustments to the original design, just to give an extra boost in their fighting abilities."

He then shifted the blueprint folder to his other arm and, pushing his leather swivel chair back in its proper place, quickly strode out of the room. The other scientists stared after him for a moment, then finally the elderly one seated near him got up from the table and walked off toward another area.

"Where are you going?" one of the others asked the old man. The elderly scientist made his response by simply turning around, gazing him directly in the eye, his hands crossed behind his back in an intelligent demeanor.

"I do believe that you heard the man quite well," the old man replied, walking over to the sliding door that John had come in earlier. "John has finally found what might solve all our problems in the field of robotics, and he needs us to assist. I don't believe that we're the ones building the actual creations now, are we?"

The others stared at him, then the woman scientist stood up and walked toward the door along with the old man. "I do believe that you're right," she told him as she stood beside him, "If John wants us to try this out, it can't hurt to take a few chances here and there." She then turned toward the remaining group of people still seated around the table. "Am I correct, my comrades?"

The others remained silent for a few more moments, then finally made their choice and stood up, walking toward the door to accompany the two. The two smiled, then the elderly man pressed the button near the side that opened the door. It slid open within time, and the group filed out to start in on what seemed like John's new triumph in robotics…

* * *

It was now late evening, and the woman scientist from earlier was walking down one of the hallways, a clipboard in one hand and a pen in the other. Being the head researcher in the area, it was her job to take notes on whatever the others came up with and show it to the head of the area immediately. She had already taken many notes on what the others were designing and had decided that she deserved a break, maybe get some coffee from the machine over near one of the research labs…

She was just about to turn the corner when John poked his head out of a nearby, ajar door in the area and said, rather loudly as so to catch her attention, "Maria!"

This worked fairly well—Maria was startled by the suddenness of it all and jumped backward slightly, nearly dropping her clipboard on the floor in the process. When she realized that it was only John and not anyone else, she sighed and, adjusting the clipboard so that it stood straight, said, rather blandly, "What do you want now, John? I was just about to call it a night…"

"You have to take a gander at this, Maria," John replied, ignoring the annoyance tone clearly within her voice. "Come on inside and I'll show you what I've got down so far." With that, he pulled his head back inside the door.

Maria sighed again, then brushed her short brown hair out of her face and walked through the still open door into a rather small room, paying some similarities to a normal operating room, if you didn't count the high-tech computers and machinery stationed every few feet within the perimeter. John was standing next to a large metal table; his body was hiding something sprawled out on top of it. As soon as Maria entered, he withdrew himself from the table and held his arms out in the direction of what he had been hiding at the time.

"My God, John," Maria exclaimed, her eyes slightly widening. "What in cyberspace _is _that thing?"

She was referring to, of course, the object stationed on top of the table, which had now turned out to be a replica of Delete—except that it wasn't entirely finished. The metallic skeleton was the only thing that John had constructed; thus, without the support of its extra coatings, it was slumped down on all fours, in an almost animalistic way. Bits and pieces of wiring stuck out from its joints, and its eyes, the only thing that told the viewer that it was Delete's skeleton, were locked directly on Maria, now. It flashed its skull-like teeth at her the moment that she made eye contact.

As Maria looked on in shock, John grinned and proudly crossed his arms over his chest. "That, my dear, is the skeleton outline for one of the blueprinted models I came across," he told her. "I'm planning on making several of each in order for reasons of testing."

"Yes, but John…" Maria stopped, then leaned over to look past John, toward one of the computer screens. She saw a model of the creature's full form; however, right next to it she could see the model of a different, rather destructive-looking robot. Between the two she could see another graphic that closely resembled a DNA strand; she would've confused it for one had it been spiraled together and not broken in some places. Biting her lip, she finally continued, pointing at the computer screen, "John, just what are you doing on that computer?"

John looked at her oddly for a moment, then finally turned around, receiving the full view of the screen behind him. "Oh, that," he laughed. "You have no need to worry about that, Maria. I'm merely using that computer to cross it with a different, more powerful robot."

"John, I thought that you said that you'd already _found_ the perfect robot," Maria said, crossing her arms. "Why do you feel the need to cross its data with a different one, then?"

"I've already told you, I did find the perfect robot…_physically_," John informed her. "The original creations, however, were timid and did not look at all like they were fit to battle. Thus, I've decided to alter their personalities ever so slightly, crossing their data circuits with those of a different robot."

"And what robot might that be, dare I ask?"

John bit his lip, then nodded his head and finally said, looking at her, "A destroyer."

"A _what_!" Maria looked aghast.

"Listen, listen, it's not what you think," John said, waving his hands in an attempt to calm the sudden outburst of panic that had befallen the room. "I know very well that a destroyer is a full-gear destruction machine, but I'm not planning on letting it get to that point. I'm just going to cross them with each other so that they can be the best fighters possible."

"John, destroyers are _insane_!" Maria objected. "The last time a destroyer got loose, it nearly killed everyone within a two mile radius of itself! And that was just _one_! If you're planning on making an entire army of these, just imagine what could go wrong! You're putting all of our lives at stake!"

"Calm down, calm down," John ordered her. "I'm not planning to jump to that point. Besides, there's still a chance that a destroyer and…whatever type that this one may be, crossed, _will not_ cause a mental blunder in their system operation."

"John, mental blunders have occurred in just destroyers alone," Maria informed him, shaking her head in disapproval. "There's a nine in ten chance that a destroyer—even when crossed—will have a disturbance in mind and malfunction."

"Listen, Maria," John snapped at her, putting his face quite close to hers as he spoke. "Our goal is to create the perfect fighting machine, and I don't see you giving any support as in what I'm doing. If you were more supportive, this might have a chance to work. Are you going to support me or are you going to back down before this is even through!"

Maria stared at him, then, knowing that it was hopeless to try to talk him out of this idea, shook her head again, then said, still sounding quite uneasy, "Very well, John. If you want support, I shall be glad in giving you a hand, but I still don't think that this is the best—"

"Very good, very good," John interrupted. He then walked over to the Delete skeleton, which was still slumped in its animalistic position in the center of the table, even though online. It fixed its gaze on John as he approached, then made a sound from within its voice chip that sounded very much like a growl as he stopped about five feet from where it was currently sitting. Maria watched as John held his hand out to the robot, then explained, "You see, Maria, when crossed with a destroyer it's not causing the robot's mind to blunder, but to make it stronger. As soon as the counterparts are built and crossed, they will be the fighter robot that all of us have dreamed about."

He took a step closer to the robot as he continued, "This model, for example, is only a shadow of what the others will represent when finished. Even though it's only a skeleton so far, it has tremendous strength, amazing agility, and every type of inner attack weapon that you may be able to think of." He cleared his throat, then added, "And there's one extra feature that I can show you in a hands-on demonstration, right here, right now. Please, hold your hand out, if you would be so kind…"

Maria looked at him, then looked over at the robot, which was slumped directly in front of her. Nervously, she lifted her hand and held it out, so that it was within inches of the robot's face. As soon as she had it within three inches of the mouth, the robot warningly growled, then its pupils narrowed and within a split second a white-hot laser had been released from its eyes. Maria yelled in surprise and jumped to the side as the laser grazed her shoulder and hit the wall behind her, causing a deafening noise. The stench of melting steel then filled their nostrils; looking behind her, Maria could see that the laser had burned a rather large hole in the wall, and the metal around it was starting to melt, making it larger. John smiled as Maria turned around, her hand to her heart.

"Lightening quick reflexes," he said, swiftly flicking his hand to represent what he was saying. "Lightening quick."

Maria rubbed her shoulder where the laser had grazed it, then shook her head and gasped, "That's not funny, John. It could've seriously hurt me."

"That's the idea, isn't it?" John said to her, glancing over at the robot, which had now lowered its head and was glaring fiercely at the floor below. "I told you that we were going to make the perfect fighting machine, and to do so you've gotta make a few deadly additions, don't you?"

"John, if the skeleton itself can generate enough power to burn a hole through the wall, just imagine what the full-bodied counterpart can do!" she objected, her hand still clamped tightly on her burnt shoulder. "How are we supposed to control these things in order for them to do our bidding?"

"That, my lady, is to be solved later on," John told her; then he turned around to face his creation. "In the meantime, however, I shall have to ask you to leave the room while I finish what I have been working on. You are free to go, Maria. If I need help I'll find you and ask you later on."

"Very well, sir," Maria said, standing up; then, taking one last look at the skeleton (which appeared to have been glaring at her), left the room and headed back down the hallway to return to what she had been doing earlier. _I think I'd fancy a cup of coffee_, she thought mentally as she turned a corner…

* * *

Two days had passed since John had first come back to the lab with the blueprints, and in those past days the scientists had made a lot of progress in their field. Due to their highly advanced system technology, they had constructed several cages in the main office, along with a few test sequences scattered throughout the lab building, in hardly any time at all. John, sure enough, had been working on building the actual counterparts themselves; hardly anyone had managed to catch a glimpse of him in the past few days. He seemed to be inside his lab every day, twenty-four hours, working. Now it was early morning, and the scientists were just putting the finishing touches on a new test trap. The elderly scientist watched from below, his hands clasped on either side of the railing.

_Is this truly the right thing to be doing?_ He pondered to himself as he watched them test it. _John said that he'd found the perfect robot, but I'm not so sure…_

"Marshall!"

At hearing this the elderly scientist whipped around, only to find John standing behind him, his hands in his pockets. He had a look of great triumph on his face; the elderly man (Marshall) wondered why this was until John said excitedly, turning around to face the door, "I've done it, Marshall. Come this way. I want you to be the first to see."

With that, he quickly walked out of the room. Marshall stared after him for a moment, sighed, then followed him through the long, twisted hallways, until they finally came to a door. John, without pausing, pressed the button in the side of the door, and it slid open to reveal a rather large room. Squinting, Marshall could see that on either side of the room were rows of the creatures that he had seen on the blueprints, only they seemed to look more powerful and high-tech than the originals had been. Their eyes were closed, their heads were flopped to one side, and all of them, either way, were strapped down to their bases by tight metal binds.

John led the gaping Marshall down further into the room as he continued, looking at the lifeless creations, "In the past few days I've managed to successfully cross and build an entire army of these robots, all of them with a different function; no two the same. Of course, they're all offline for the time being; I want to only program three and see how they maneuver before testing all of them and eventually selling them to the cybersites that need them…therefore, I am going to show you the three creations that I am most proud of."

He then led Marshall to the very end of the room, which was nothing more than a large wall with several colored wires sticking out from a computer near the side. However, it was what was strapped to the wall that awed Marshall, of course. Held tight by iron binds were three different capsules, the very same type used for putting mortals in suspended animation. What was inside the capsules Marshall could not clearly make out, but he did see the shadowed head of one of the counterparts, the one in dead center. However, this did not help him much, until John said:

"Inside these three capsules are three of my finest creations. I've entitled them D-bird, 57, and Rakton, and their names will be known that way forever more. But I did not bring you here to simply tell you about them, Marshall; oh no, I've brought you here to show you them physically. Which means that you are about to witness the coming to life of my first three triumph creations."

He walked over to the machine in the corner, the one that the wires protruding from the capsule were connected to. Reaching up near the wall adjacent to it, he pulled down two pairs of goggles; one of these he tossed to Marshall. "Put this on," he commanded as he slipped his own pair over his eyes. "I'm using electrical currents to power them, and they've been known to blind people at high power."

Marshall slipped on his goggles without hesitating, then turned to look at John as he reached near a lever located in the side of the machine. "Keep them on at all costs," he warned Marshall, before he pulled the lever entirely down. "The first few seconds will _not_ be pretty."

Marshall nodded, then both of them looked over at the capsules as a white-hot burst of electricity wound its way through the wires attached to the machine and reached the capsules, surrounding them with a white light. Marshall nearly shielded his eyes, but remembered that he was protected by the goggles, and instead watched in awe as the capsules glowed brighter. Looking over in John's direction, his gaze caught the screen that determined the creations' power levels, and his mouth dropped open.

"John!" he shouted, over the loud sounds of the electrical surge. John looked at him, but made no response; Marshall, even more determined to warn him, cupped his hands to his mouth and shouted, even louder than before, "_John_!"

John continued to stare at him; Marshall grunted in frustration and ran over to him, taking care not to trip over any of the wires strewn about the ground. Clapping his hand down on John's shoulder, he put his face up to his ear and hissed, in a rather loud voice as so not to make himself unheard again, "John, shut the machine off! Now!"

"Why?" John asked him, looking confused.

"John, I'm serious," Marshall said, sounding worried. "Something's horribly wrong with the amount of current that's coming in through the wires. Their power levels are out of control! You have to shut the machine off!"

"What?" John said, still in his state of confusion; Marshall growled and was about to repeat what he had been saying when the two abruptly heard a loud slamming sound from within one of the capsules. Both men looked over toward the direction of the noise and saw, to their horror, several large dents embossed in one of the capsules.

"Good God!" John exclaimed; then he at once reached for the lever as the slamming sound came again. Grasping it tightly in one of his now sweaty hands, he gritted his teeth, then, taking one last look at the damaged capsules, shoved the lever back upward. Within a few seconds of this, the electrical current started to die out; then it finally stopped altogether. John harshly panted, glad that the main part was over, but that was the least of his problems.

At being shut off, the capsules immediately opened themselves, seeing that they had been programmed to do so for such purposes after powering. A thick cloud of mist and smoke rose from within the capsules as the silhouettes of three figures appeared within them, then stepped forward. The mist was the first to clear from the creation to the left, the one that had been making the dents in the capsule that it was placed in. Marshall's mouth dropped open again, while John weakly smiled and removed his goggles.

The first creation, now seen in full view, had been revealed to be Buzz's counterpart, no doubt. The stocky build and short appendages were a complete giveaway on this one's appearance. However, instead of being a light teal-ish color, as Buzz was, this one was jet black all over, except for the mask and the shoes, which had turned out to be the original teal. Its other facial features were gray, except for the eyes, which were a deep, blood-red color. It now looked up at its creator and bared its teeth, its head lowered.

Marshall was greatly surprised. "That thing was the one making all the dents?" he said, sounding awestruck as he pointed at the short robot counterpart. "But it's so small! How could it possibly have—"

Before Marshall could finish his sentence, however, the robot growled and held up its rather large knuckles, then completely uncurled its hands, revealing two sets of six-inch talons built in to either hand. Its gaze locked on Marshall, it snarled angrily, then with a loud roar leapt forward, its claws brandished in his direction.

Marshall screamed and shielded his eyes, but before the counterpart could have a chance to slice into him John whipped a remote-like device out of his pocket and pressed the button in the center. As if on demand, several coils of blue energy emitted from it wrapped their way around the creature's wrists and formed an electrical chain leading to the ground, binding it by force. It snarled at John, then snapped at Marshall and remained still.

John tossed the aghast Marshall the device he had used to bring the robot down and said, "Here, Marshall. You might need this if he tries to attack you again…he attacks anything that moves, so don't be too offended by his actions."

"Not at all," Marshall said quickly, shaking his head. He stuck the device into his pocket and removed his goggles. "So…this is…uh, Rakton, am I correct?"

John shook his head. "This is 57. Rakton and D-bird are standing over there."

Marshall's eyes widened, then he turned around to face the other two counterparts. The one on the left, now hovering in the air with the use of its tail, was a Digit counterpart, no doubt; none of the others looked that exact same way. However, it was missing its cap, had several pointed teeth protruding from its mouth, and, like 57, was entirely black save a few gray areas. It had a dark brown bow tie around its neck, and around each wing was a black, sharp studded dog collar bracelet.

The right one was a Delete counterpart, except it paid no striking resemblance to Delete, save the fact that the original structure looked almost exactly like its original. It was entirely black, like the other two, except for its collar, mask, shoes, and cord, which were tinted gray, yellow, and teal. Its eyes were an eerie yellow-green color, and in place of its right arm, which Marshall thought was the most stunning, was a metallic, high-tech robotic claw. Both counterparts stood beside each other, their forms unmoving, their mouths untwitching. John grinned as he eyed the two.

"Aren't they the most amazing things that you've ever seen?" John asked, rubbing his hands together. "Yes, I'm quite sure that we can take it to the limit with these three. If they succeed in every test that we give them, I'm sure that we can power up the other counterparts in time for us to finally achieve our goal."

"So, what are you planning on doing with them first?" Marshall asked casually, still nervously eyeing 57, who was giving him a threatening glare (that and the longing look in his eyes that showed Marshall clearly that he wanted to rip him apart). "Are you going to start running the tests tonight?"

"Wrong, my good man," John informed him. "We shall start the tests early afternoon. In the meantime, I want you to call the rest of the party together. Tell them that I've succeeded in programming three of the selected counterparts for testing."

Marshall looked at him, then at the counterparts, then finally sucked in a breath through his teeth and said, "Very well, John. I shall inform the others of the deed at once."

"Good, Marshall, good," John replied, nodding. Marshall turned around and was about to walk back to where he had been earlier when John held up his hand and halted him. "Not so fast. I want you to bind them for me before I make any further movements."

"Me? Why me?"

"You're the one with the device, Marshall. Or in case you haven't noticed."

Marshall growled; then, without hesitating to arouse an argument, whipped out the device and clicked it twice. In a few seconds, Rakton and D-bird had been bound by the energy wires that had held 57, in the exact same way. John smiled, then patted Rakton on the head and gripped the frontal wire binding them with a metal tongs that he had picked up from his experiment table.

"Let's go, Marshall," he ordered; then the two departed from the area, dragging the three robotic counterparts along with them.

* * *

"You've done it?"

"Yes, I have," John told the table of scientists, sounding quite pleased with himself. "I told you that I'd make the perfect fighting machines, and the most intelligent battlers to exist in the field of robotics. I believe that I've succeeded in both fields, my good men."

"John, I still don't trust those counterparts of yours," Maria, who had come back from her break earlier, said. "There's something about them—I just don't trust it. I really don't think that this was the best idea."

"Nonsense!" John replied stubbornly. "You don't know what you're saying, Maria. I can assure you that these robots will do us no harm in any way. 57 and D-bird have already been locked up in electrical cages in my office, I'm going to test them later this evening, and I'm going to show you just what Rakton can do in a few moments."

"And just what is Rakton going to do to prove himself, may I ask?"

"He just so happens to be doing head-on combat with one of our largest robot rejects," John replied, trying his hardest to ignore the dripping sarcasm in Maria's tone; then he turned in the direction of the balcony and called out, "Is Rakton at ready?"

There was a short moment of silence, then a man's voice called down from below, "Yes, sir! Rakton has been unbound and is ready to fight!"

"Very good," John muttered to himself; then he called down, "Very well, then. Exit the field and release the opposition!" He then turned to the table of scientists and said to them, "You might want to come closer to the balcony to witness this, my friends. And I do hope that you've brought goggles—it might get very messy out there."

The other scientists in the group uneasily shot each other nervous glances, then they came forward and leaned over the balcony in time to see Rakton standing in the center of the field, his eyes dangerously narrowed at the opposition, now noisily approaching the field. The opposing robot was much larger, about five or six times the little robot's size, and paid some striking resembalances to some type of beetle creature. It made clanking noises as it scuttled along; Rakton was unfazed by its appearance and size, even though it slightly frightened a few of the people on the field set to control the creature.

As soon as the beetle was within ten feet of Rakton, it stopped abruptly, steam hissing out of its joints. After a moment of tension, the beetle finally shattered it by raising its foreleg and bringing it down, aiming in Rakton's direction. The smaller robot, however, noticed that this was coming and coiled and sprung, the claw narrowly grazing his right leg as he did so.

As he landed, the beetle thundered toward him, then swiped again. Rakton dodged the blow for the most part by ducking under it, but it didn't seem to be a clean miss; as the claw swept by him it grazed his nasal area, not enough to seriously damage it but leaving a long, deep gash as a consequence. Rakton yelped, then brought his hand to his face, giving the beetle time to swipe at him again.

This time the aim was true—the claw stuck Rakton across the stomach and thew him backward, causing him to slam dead-on into the wall. Letting out a whimper of pain, he sank to the ground and brought his free hand up to his newly made wound, which was beginning to drip battery fluid, or "robotic" blood. The beetle, seeing its chance to finish him off, thundered forward, preparing to smash him further into the ground and eventually crush him in two.

Rakton remained motionless for the most part; he was either in too much pain or too stubborn with the principle to fight. John gritted his teeth and clasped his hands tightly together in tension; the others looked on nervously as the beetle creature drew closer…closer…

Then, at the last second, Rakton's eyes sprung open, he removed his hand from his stomach and got to his feet. As the beetle lifted up its claw to smash him as planned, Rakton sprung forward and grabbed the claw with both hands, then started to quickly climb his way up it toward the beetle's head. The creature had no idea what was going on; it was artificially programmed and thus did not have a brain or mind of any type; yet it could still sense Rakton's presence. Furied, it angrily swiped its claw up toward where Rakton was running…which was the wrong thing to do at a time such as this.

Rakton had been running near the head at the time, so it didn't take a genius to figure out what the robot had in mind. He bounced off the head just as the claw came down; the scientists watched in both amazement in horror as with a loud _KA-CHUNK_, the missed its target and sliced its head off in his place. It fell to the floor with a loud _CLANG_, sparks flying from its neck, as Rakton landed gracefully next to it, then without further ado reached for the head with both hands.

The scientists watched on in curiosity, wondering what Rakton was planning on doing, then suddenly noticed that the beetle had not been fully defeated. Even though headless, it was still able to function, and could still sense Rakton's presence. It was now preparing to swipe at him again; it had its now bloodied claw raised directly over his head. Still, Rakton refused to move, even though it was obvious that he sensed the creature's attack coming.

Just as the creature swiped its claw down, however, Rakton picked up the head and held it over his own, causing the claw to slice through the metallic skull. The head now fell to the ground in two halves; Rakton then darted off in the dumbfounded creature's direction and ran once more onto its back. Once directly on top, he then coiled, leapt up into the air, then remained still for a few moments, as if in meditation. The scientists were just about to comment on how he had managed to do this when he came down, landing hard on the creature's back. Rakton's strength and the combined force of the blow was too much for the creature to handle; it creaked, then broke in half entirely, along with the skull.

As it fell to the ground in a heap of wires, Rakton, now covered in the creature's blood, looked around hungrily, then, spotting the other two scientists, slowly started to advance on them. However, Marshall had been stationed down there as one of the scientists to do the job and bound him before he could do any further harm.

As Rakton was led off toward John's office to accompany the other two creations, John looked down from above; he was now grinning broadly as he looked at the other scientists.

"My God," he said, an almost laugh in his voice as he pointed to the battlefield below. "My God, did—did you see that? That's amazing—that right there—"

"I know, John," Maria said, looking up toward the ceiling and shaking her head. "You've done it. You've finally done it."


	4. Part III

**CYBERCHASE: THE ANDROIDIAN REVOLUTION**

**CHAPTER THREE**

**Science log entry:**

_I am both pleased and relieved to say that within a period of two days, I have managed to finally succeed in creating what I had wanted to all of my life. Just this evening I ran tests on my three programmed creations: D-bird, 57, and Rakton. Due to the concern that I might as soon forget them as I did with my other goals, I have made the choice of putting their ideal features down in this entry._

_First off is 57, the counterpart I created using the first blueprint to come to mind. Due to the fact that he is a crossbreed, he came out with a giant set of razor-sharp talons on either hand. The knuckles are much bigger than what I had imagined, and it seems rather awkward, but the creature is amazing when it comes to combat. I ran him against another copy of the beetle creature, and he did very well—almost better than Rakton at first. He didn't pause, and he didn't even give it any thought, it seemed—as soon as the beetle made the slightest movement toward him, he roared, jumped on it and began ripping it apart. When he had finished there was nothing left of the beetle creature; it would've been hard to tell that there was one there at all had the thing's blood not been splattered all over the battlefield in the process._

_During the other tests 57 responded to the challenge with brute strength and force, and that only. I have found in the last run of tests that the robot is inhumanely strong; it could be possible for his type to serve in places with heavy objects. Who knows, perhaps I might set his type a job in helping people out of snowy areas—that is, if he didn't rip them apart first. In spite of his low bout of intelligence, 57 is tenacious and stubborn and will stop at nothing to rip apart his selected target. As for his vocabulary…I have never heard him speak a word of English, or even a foreign language. He communicates in a series of snarls and growls, which we will probably never come close to translating. Every now and then I do wonder what gears are turning in that animalistic mind of his…_

_Second off is D-bird, another one of the creations that I take most pride in. D-bird appears to be the most intelligent of the three, and he certainly shows it during the tests. Again I did the run with yet another beetle creature (my last one, at that), and instead of strategy or strength, as Rakton and 57 had done, he dazzled us with a show of tremendous agility. You could barely see him as he fought the creature, and when he had done, there was not a scratch on him, save a drop of blood._

_This caught my interest, and so I decided to strap a mile indicator to his back and set him loose outside. He quickly zipped off, kicking up some dust as he did so, then came back down to me. After removing the mile indicator from his back, I calculated the results and found out, shocking as it seemed, that this one bird could reach mach speed in as little as 2.8 seconds. He did the same thing through the remainder of the tests; the others were greatly surprised and wondered how I managed to do that. The truth is, I don't exactly know what caused that to happen; perhaps the merge with the bird's skeleton and the destroyer's strength allows him to do that without his structure falling apart._

_Although highly intelligent, D-bird rarely speaks and instead makes up for it in body movements. Of course, it can be very hard to read these, seeing that he's nearly as fast as the common hummingbird in normal flight alone, but it's the only way to know what he wants, so we have to make do. I know that he can talk; he can probably speak highly intelligent words, but he is either too stubborn or timid at the moment to do so with us._

_Lastly is Rakton, the counterpart of the timid little robot I met three days ago at the Evil Convention. However, Rakton is far from timid, and has proven it in his previous battles. Many times so far he has amazed me, and I do hope that he'll keep at it. I have trusted the others in handling and recording 57 and D-bird, but Rakton is mine, and mine only. I am normally not one to pick favorites, but I am more pleased with Rakton than I am with 57 and D-bird combined. _

_It's an odd thing about Rakton, though—unlike 57 and D-bird, who use brute strength and agility to best their foes, Rakton uses a combination of both, along with his mind. Try as I might, I just cannot spring anything on him without him finding out beforehand and doing something about it. Just like with the beetle creature, he has mentally calculated where the thing was going to attack and jumped to that particular spot. Many times in testing Rakton have I seen the enemy slice its appendages off with its own claws or other form of weaponry. I don't exactly know how he does it; maybe it's just that his brain somehow mutated during the crossing._

_This might prove, however, that Rakton has a high form of intelligence. I'm not sure if he is smarter than D-bird, exactly, but I know that he's more intelligent and less animalistic than 57 is. Like D-bird, I have never heard him speak, except for an occasional battle cry when he fights._

_However, this does not matter to me. All that matters is the strength and power, now, and the intelligence and schooling can be pushed aside for now. Rakton, D-bird, and 57 have bested everything that we could possibly throw at them, so starting tomorrow we shall proceed to the next step of the testing. That's correct; starting tomorrow I am going to test them against one another, to find out which one is the most powerful. My guesses are that it will be Rakton, no doubt, but I shall give the other two a chance as well before judging them._

_About the other scientists…lately they—most of the time Maria and Marshall, who have witnessed the bringing to life of my creations—have been saying that crossing their data with a destroyer's and programming them to attack anything that opposes them is a bad idea, and that I never should have done it. I say what do they know; I am glad for stealing Mr. Hacker's blueprints and making better creations from them. He'll never notice that his blueprints are gone, I'll bet…he's already too wrapped up in his plans to rule all of cyberspace to even notice that his folders were even touched._

_Back on topic. If this goes through, I might be able to program the others and sell them at high profit to the cybersites that need them, or enjoy watching two robots clash with each other in a bloody situation of winner-takes-all. And then, I'll finally have succeeded, at long last. I'll finally have created the ultimate fighting machines!_

**…This entry has been processed and written by John Live.**

* * *

Little did John know that as he sat at his desk writing these notes about his creations, the actual creations, now contained within the steel cages behind him, were restless. He had thought that they had been asleep as he locked the doors, but in real life they were far from it. Now the dark figure in the nearest cage, his eyes glowing, sat slumped in the corner, his slitted pupils fixated on John, still currently writing in his science log. A growl escaped his throat as his pupils narrowed even further, then he hissed in a strikingly familiar voice.

"Insolent fool," were the words he spoke. "Why does he think that he has full right to control us? He's treating us as if we don't even have human emotions…"

The creature then turned around to face the other cages, a beam of moonlight from the nearby window hitting his face as he did so, revealing it to be Rakton who had spoken. He had now fixed his gaze on the creatures within the other two cages adjacent to him, which contained, sure enough, 57 and D-bird. D-bird was curled up on the floor in an almost chicken-like manner, while 57 was pacing around in his cage, his hands uncurled to reveal the animalistic weapons that he bore. Both turned to look at Rakton when they realized that he was staring at them, at the same time nursing his wounds from the battle earlier, which had stopped bleeding for the most part but still greatly pained him.

"We have been at hand and foot for this imbecile for much too long," Rakton told them, as D-bird slowly flew over and perched himself on the horizontal bars of the cage. "In just one evening he has belted out tests by the thousands…and I for one am sickened by it."

"Grrr!" 57 responded, curling his claws over the bars of the cage. D-bird nodded silently, then tossed his head back and said:

"I fully agree with you, Rakton; I too am nauseated by his attempts to prove that we're the strongest machines in the history of his silly little robotic world." He gritted his teeth, then continued, "But we have no choice but to follow his lead. Even though we may be strong, we have no clue as to how strong our creator or any of these…these _people_ are. They could have the ability to crush us into fine dust with their pinky and forefinger, and we are unknowing of it."

"Come _on_!" Rakton shot back, his upper lip curled to the point where the other two creatures could see his teeth. "We are obviously stronger than all of them combined. Just a few hours ago I've figured out that we've been crossed with destroyers…do you know how many of those people live in fear of destroyers?"

"That may be true, but we should still follow and remain safe, rather than take the lead and risk life and limb just to prove once and for all that we don't need anyone." D-bird was now pacing back and forth in front of the two as he spoke. "We may be strong, but there is the strong possibility that our creators are stronger—"

"You know, for someone who has such a high intelligence quotient, you're pretty stupid!" Rakton snapped, stopping D-bird in his tracks. "If he's so strong, why do you think that he keeps us in cages at night, while he sleeps? Why do you think he makes us battle other creatures instead of fighting us himself? Why do you think that he relies on these foul items to keep us grounded?"

At this, he held up his hands, reminding the two of the heavy chains that had been strapped around their wrists before they had been locked away for the night. D-bird looked at him in defeat as Rakton lowered his hands, then hissed, "Don't you two see? We have no need to be afraid of _him_. It is _he_ who is afraid of _us_."

The two lowered their heads in a bout of shame as Rakton continued, "This does serve as an advantage for what I have planned, however. I have found out that the one thing keeping us from destroying the entire lab altogether is something that they have greatly underestimated for much too long."

"Oh, really?" D-bird said, leaning against the bars of his cage. 57 growled in agreement. "And just what exactly might that be?"

"The power," Rakton said, his face becoming eerily sunken as the moonlight illuminated it. "The only thing that's keeping us down is the power. If it's shut off, they're left completely defenseless…"

57 and D-bird looked at Rakton, then at each other, then, finally realizing what he was getting to, broke out into evil, toothy grins and turned their gaze toward Rakton. Now their faces, too, appeared deeply sunken, and for a reason too…

"It starts tomorrow," Rakton murmured to them. "The end will come for them first thing tomorrow…and they can do nothing to stop us…_nothing_…"

* * *

"Up and at 'em, boys!"

Rakton groggily opened one eye in time to see John, standing at the now open doors of his cage, his hands on his hips and a knowing grin on his face. The robot snarled and was about to drift back off to sleep, when he suddenly heard a loud slamming sound near the spot where he was lying. Looking up, he could see 57 at the edge of his own cage, his claws curled over the bars yet again and a threatening look on his face.

"Graaarrr!" the stocky robot growled, narrowing his eyes at his comrade. Rakton, getting the message at last, slowly hoisted himself up, then pulled himself to his feet as John unhooked the chains that still bound him from the walls, and tugged him out of the cage. Looking over, the robot could then see Marshall, or so the man was called, pulling 57 from his cage.

Normally 57 would've put up a fight with the man, being the tenacious creature that he was, but this time he appeared to be calm and well-behaved as Marshall pulled him out of the cage with, like Rakton, the chains currently wrapped around his wrists. Rakton smiled as he watched 57's perfect etiquette; if he kept this up until D-bird did his part the scheme he had in mind would fall together perfectly. Looking up at John, then over at Marshall, he knew that it was only a matter of time…

Marshall noticed this change of demeanor as the two scientists walked out of John's office and down the hallway. Looking down at the now quiet, obedient 57, then over at Rakton, who wasn't making any sudden fierce movements or noises, the old man's eyes widened slightly in surprise, then he turned his head in John's direction and said, "John, your creations seem to be very…well-behaved this morning."

John turned his gaze toward him. "So?"

Marshall grunted in frustration. "John, they aren't normally like this when we bring them into the arena. While we were running the tests I can remember countless times when 57 tried to break free of his binds and claw at me. Rakton was no better; he was mellower, I'll say that, but he too was stubborn and irritable."

As Marshall said these words, both 57 and Rakton turned to look at the old man, their eyes narrowed dangerously. A low growl escaped 57's throat, and he began to raise his claws, but Rakton spotted this out and jabbed his finger downward, the sign that told the stocky robot to put his claws down. 57 looked over at him, then obeyed, though the angered glare never left his eyes.

_You'll have your moment of glory, 57_, Rakton thought to himself, looking at his comrade. _If you can just hold out until D-bird does his job…_

* * *

D-bird, sure enough, remained in his cage as the scientists departed, giving him time to work out his part in the plan. He had appeared to have been sleeping along with the others as the scientists opened the cages and dragged 57 and Rakton out, but in truth he was wide awake, waiting for the scientists to leave so that he could perfect his part, as mentioned earlier. Now, as soon as the doors had closed, D-bird uncurled himself from his sleeping position and, stretching his wings, slowly flew over to one of the sides of his cage.

Placing one of his wings on the bars, he slowly ran it along the edge, then, nodding, fixed his gaze on the targeted bar and, concentrating as hard as possible, narrowed his pupils and fired a white-hot laser in its direction. It struck the bar, and D-bird continued to do this until the metal that the bar had been constructed of began to melt, forming a small, silver puddle on the floor of the office. Finally, the remaining area of the bar creaked and swung down, forming a small, if not anything else, opening.

Flashing a toothy grin, he did this with three more bars, then finally drew himself back and, gathering up enough power, shot forward with tremendous speed, hitting the slightly melted bars and with a sickening _KRRIACK_ broke them from the cage as he departed. They clattered to the floor as the bird stopped in midair of the high roof of the office and looked down to admire his work; then he flew toward a window near the top, crashing through the glass as he departed from the office altogether...

Once outside, it was easy for the bird to fly along and remain unseen, considering that the outer laboratory had an incredibly large circumference. Keeping close to the roof, he flew across the laboratory area, not at mach speed but enough to shoot by the windows undetected. He refused to falter, and, upon passing the area where Rakton and 57 were to "fight" each other, even dare to glance in the window. He only had one thing on his mind, and that was to do his part in the plan so that they would prove themselves once and for all to be strong…_without_ the help of their creators.

As he reached the end of the laboratory, he shifted downward, heading closer to ground level, then shot along the electrical fence that surrounded the laboratory, tilting himself to the side as he did so. His eyes narrowed in determination, he zigzagged through the metal statues of the scientists of the past that surrounded the grounds, then brought himself to a stop in front of a large billboard, which bore the words:

**Electrical Power Plant**

**Warning: High voltage. No persons allowed beyond this point.**

Smiling evilly, he shot past the sign, heading toward one of the windows of the power plant, and, being the naturally swift creature that he was, had smashed through it within seconds. Glass shards fell to the floor, which, unfortunately for the destroyer-bird, provoked the attention of the operating scientists below him. Looking up toward the shattered window, their gaze fell upon the black bird, then they muttered things among themselves. D-bird, wanting in on their conversation, adjusted his hearing in time to hear:

"It's loose. Good God, it's loose. You _must_ inform John at once…that thing is a destroyer crossbreed. It has the power to kill us all…"

D-bird narrowed his eyes, then ignored them and shot off across the top of the building, heading in the direction of the main power generator. Rakton had informed him of its location; his job now was to disable it in time for the scientists to be left defenseless. However, he had ordered D-bird to leave one area in the lab on: the generators in the room that powered the currently inanimate creations.

Continuing to shoot down the hallway, he then made a sharp turn upward, smashing through the heat register and into the air vent. Without pausing, he continued to zigzag down the air vent's chambers, until he finally came to his acquired target: another heat register below him. Turning downward at the last moment, he smashed through this one as well, entering a rather large and equally bright room. Ignoring the surprised and startled yells of the scientists currently in the area, he swooped past them and took another sharp turn upward. He then came to a halt in front of a rather large control panel, which read:

Main Power Control 

_Warning: Do not disconnect unless in case of emergency._

Once again giving another evil smile, he once again ignored the terrified yells of the scientists in the room and, reeling back, smashed through the heavy metal panel, causing small bits of metal and bolts to clatter to the floor, provoking even more signs of fear from the scientists below him. Over the sparking of the wires within the panel itself, he heard several more yells:

"The panel! It's busted through the panel!"

"Oh God, someone get it away from the system! It'll cut the power!"

"Where's John? Hasn't anyone contacted John yet?"

_Rakton was right_, D-bird thought in disgust, looking down at the scientists below as he continued to hover in the air, with the support of his tail. _These people are treating us like we're nothing but vicious animals…well, they're about to learn that we're more…much more._

Blocking out the sounds of any further yells, he shot through the panel, entering the large world of sparking, colored wires that made up the main control system…this collection of wires was the only thing keeping them grounded, he knew, and at this he narrowed his eyes. If he could find the right wires and disconnect them, the main obstacle of the plan would be out of the way. Then they would be free to finally prove themselves…take over…

When he came to what appeared to be the center of the tangle of wires, he slowed down, then, flapping his wings like an eagle when landing, set himself down on the hard metallic floor of the area. He then started scanning the ground, searching for the correct wires that kept the area online to the power.

Of course, due to his naturally brilliant mind, this didn't take long at all. Finding the correct wires in record time, he gathered them up in one wing, then held them up to his razor-sharp beak and, opening his mouth, bit down on the wires, snapping them in half instantly. He waited patiently for a few moments, then dropped the wires and shot back off toward the opening that he had made in the system. Streaking out in a black blur, he shot out of the upper window in the building's main room just as he heard the _CRREEAAAK_ of the lab's generators coming to a fatal and possibly eternal halt…

* * *

"I don't get this…" John, unaware of D-bird's deed, was growing impatient with 57 and Rakton, who, as according to plan, had not budged from their spots on the battlefield since the group of scientists working for this test run had brought them in. They were now standing at either end of the battlefield, facing each other, calm looks on their faces, stubbornly refusing to move no matter how the scientists pushed and nagged. John couldn't understand it…57 was born to fight, almost, and Rakton, even though he had more common sense, would never miss the chance to fight anyone or anything. But now…he just couldn't understand it.

"I just don't get this," John repeated, shaking his head as he looked down at the two, a confused and slightly disappointed gaze contorted on his face. "They love to fight against other creatures…but now when I'm putting them against one another, they're refusing. Why is this?" He turned to Marshall, who was standing behind him and looking every bit as confused as he was at the moment. Marshall shrugged.

"I don't know, sir," he replied, adjusting the clipboard he had in his hand. "Perhaps there's more to them than you think…maybe they sense some sort of bond between them…"

"Honestly, Marshall, do you really believe that they have emotions?" John asked hotly. "I doubt that they sense the fact that they could possibly be partners in crime. They're probably just refusing to fight because we woke them up too early…get off of your soapbox, old man."

Marshall glared at him; he felt offended by the man's words. Rakton and 57, even though they had nothing that Marshall had, felt the exact same way; they had heard every word the man had said thanks to their large hearing range. 57 uttered a low growl and balled his large knuckles into tight fists, while Rakton's eyes narrowed. Taking a shaky breath to steady himself, he looked up at 57, who was glaring at John and looked like he wanted to rip him to shreds more than anything at the moment. Rakton shot him a look that told him to calm down; 57 spotted this and uncurled his hands. Rakton then sighed and looked down toward the electrical binds that were still clamped tightly around his wrists.

_Come on, D-bird_, he thought, his brain sounding rather desperate at that moment, _where are you? Get it over with, already…_

As if by miracle, the moment he straightened his head back up to look at 57, the lights began to slowly flicker; the remaining power processed by the generators had apparently lost its strength and was wearing low. His anger turning into an evil feeling, he looked up at John and Marshall, who were staring up at the lights, then, as if finally realizing something, turned to look down at 57 and Rakton, their eyes wide with terror.

"The p-power…" he heard John stammer as he continued to stare at them, his eyes still wide. "I-it's out…we've underestimated the power…this—this can't b-be h-happening…"

57 and Rakton then looked down at their binds as the electrical currents gave off several crackling noises, then slowly faded away, freeing them of their despised bonds at long last. Rubbing his wrist, both robots looked down at their hands, then, finally getting used to the fact that they were free at last, looked up at the two scientists, evil grins spreading over their faces. John, sensing the danger in their gazes, gave out several frightened gasps, then placed his hand to his chest and drew back.

"Oh God," he stuttered, as Marshall tried to calm him down, even though he too was just as frightened as John was. "Oh God, oh God, oh sweet heavenly God…"

Now that the power was out of the way, it was time to carry out the final step of the plan. Turning their gazes back toward the battlefield, 57 and Rakton uttered low growls, then slowly approached the two scientists guarding the doors to the battlefield, their eyes narrowed evilly and their natural weapons brandished.

The two scientists, at once sensing what was going to happen, panicked and tried to get out, but the doors were locked tightly due to the lackage of power in the system. Screaming in fear as the two robots advanced, they banged on the door with all the force that they had, desperately trying to get it to open, but their screams were in vain, for within a split second Rakton and 57 were upon them. Within a few seconds, the stocky robot and the lanky robot had ripped into them, and in no time at all their white lab coats were stained a bright crimson.

Marshall, of course, had witnessed the whole thing from above; John was too horrified to even look down, and was currently panting harshly, his hand to his forehead. Marshall, being much older than John, still had common sense within his brain, and, after seeing 57 and Rakton reduce their two victims to nothing but a pile of cloth and gore, quickly turned around, grabbed him by the shoulders, and started shaking him, in hopes of snapping him out of his state.

"John!" he snapped, shaking him violently. "John!"

John finally snapped out of his trance and, his breath coming in terrified sobs, moaned, "What, Marshall?"

"John, we need to keep them at bay until someone finds a way to get the power on. Don't we have any form of self-defense in case of emergency?"

John looked at the old man awhile, then finally shook his head. "Everything we have here runs on electrical power," he gasped. "I never thought that something like this would happen, or else I would've given it second thoughts…"

Marshall cursed under his breath angrily, then said to John, slightly more calm than he had been before, "Okay, then. I'm sure that the scientists we've stationed in the power plant will work this out, but until then we need to keep ourselves alive as long as possible. We must warn the others of the danger, however…you know what they can do, and so do I, and if they get away with this all our work will have been in vain. I only thank the Lord that we just have three creations to deal with—"

_THACLANG!_

The two scientists stopped short and looked below them as 57, using brute strength, as usual, sunk his claws easily into the metal surface of the door, then, emitting a determined growl, pulled them backward, taking the door along with them. He growled again, then tossed the door aside, and the two robots ran through the opening and out into the hallways. Marshall and John both gasped at the sight of this; Marshall clapped his hand over his mouth while John's pale face turned milky white. His hands shook as he grasped the rail at the edge, his breath coming in quick gasps yet again.

After a few seconds, John swiftly turned around and said quickly, "We need to call the police. Now. They'll be sure to put a stop to this at once…"

"But John," Marshall protested, shaking his head, "The cyber-police force is strict on lawbreakers. And in case you haven't noticed, my good man, we're guilty as charged of the crime of both illegal research and theft. We could spend years in the big house…"

"I don't care, Marshall," John said slowly, running over to the desk and picking up the receiver of the phone centered in it. "We may have to do time, but it's better than death. A lot better than death…"

* * *

Rakton and 57, meanwhile, had gone out of the doorway and were now thundering down the hallways at high speed, not caring a night about what was in their way; they were invincible enough to reduce it to powder in the blink of an eye. 57 appeared to be having a better time than Rakton was, namely when it came to destroying things, but Rakton had a better sense of navigation than his comrade had. He also could run much faster due to his build; thus he took the lead, and 57 followed.

They had just come into a large hallway when a group of three or four scientists ran in. They stopped dead when they saw Rakton and 57, who slowed to a halt and stared at them, their eerie eyes scanning their structure. There was silence throughout the room, then finally the scientist in front spoke up: "What on earth are those things doing out here?"

Rakton heard 57 growl, then with a loud scream leapt at the one in front, the one who had spoken, and sunk his claws into his back. The scientist screamed while the others gasped, dying to run yet frozen with fear; as 57 clawed apart the man's back Rakton stood there for a few moments, making no attempt to stop him. Their scheme was in the bag now; it was only a matter of time before all of them fell just like the first two.

As 57 now continued to rip the man apart, this time using the aid of his teeth, Rakton finally kicked in to his fighting instincts and, targeting the scientist next to the one in front, coiled and sprung. His hand and claw hit the scientist—another male—in the chest; he fell backward, thus knocking the wind out of him. He didn't have time to get it back, however, for just as he was about to take a breath Rakton sliced across his face with his robotic claw. He then resumed to what 57 had been doing earlier—ripping him limb from limb.

57, who was a faster fighter than Rakton was when it came to reducing things to gore, finished up with the first scientist and leapt upon the third one, clawing him vigorously with all the force he had; it didn't take long before that one was reduced to gore as well. Rakton finished clawing up the other scientist, then their leering eyes both fell on the remaining two scientists—one had turned out to be Maria, the other one was unknown to them. The two scientists at once sensed what was going to happen, and, finally summoning the nerve to move, screamed and ran. Rakton and 57 narrowed their eyes, then bolted off after them.

Maria ran for her life, her breath barely coming to her; she knew that the two attackers were close behind due to the clanging of their feet on the metallic surface of the floor. Urging her feet to go faster, she and the scientist accompanying her finally turned a corner and ran into the room nearest them—just as they felt a cold breeze of wind on the backs of their heads. Ignoring it, Maria and the scientist quickly dashed in, slamming the metal door behind them, and pressed themselves against it, to keep their attackers out for the time being. Gasping for breath and daring not to look out the small glass window that served as a window into the room, they leaned against the door and sighed, thinking that they were safe for the time being.

They were about to be proven wrong, for just as they looked up they saw D-bird, who had swooped into the room just as they were entering it (hence the gust of wind they both felt) and was now hovering at the edge of the room, his eyes narrowed at the two. Maria and the scientist looked at each other, then back up at the bird as his face broke out into a menacing grin; he then swooped down with such agility that they could no longer see him physically. They then heard a _KA-CHUNK_ sound, and after that all was still.

They looked at each other again, wondering what on earth that was about, then finally looked straight ahead and saw, to their horror, that the room they had entered was the room that contained the currently lifeless creations. However, that was about to change, for as they looked over further they saw, even more to their dread, that in his descending D-bird had pulled down the lever that turned on the power that allowed the creatures to enliven. They knew that there was nothing that they could do to stop it; D-bird was leering down at them from his perch above.

"How—how—the power's off—" Maria stuttered, looking up at the glaring bird.

At this D-bird broke into a demented smile and said, grinning menacingly, "I made a few…_adjustments_ to the power levels right after I cut it. Hope you enjoy playing with our band of little friends." He then laughed cruelly.

Maria and the scientist looked up at him, then looked down upon hearing the horrifying _CLINK_ sounds that unbound the now animated creations from their posts. Stretching their limbs and uttering awakened groans, the creations arose from the spots where they had been positioned, then, sensing an offending presence in the room immediately, turned to look at Maria and the other scientist, who were now paling with mortal terror. There were about 17 or 18 total; they looked at the two, then glared—some flashed their uncomfortably sharp teeth—and, growling, began to advance on them, evil and demented gazes on all of their faces as they stepped.

After several moments of staring, the scientist standing next to Maria finally screamed and, whipping around, grabbed the doorknob that had been used to close the door. Maria watched frantically as he tried to tug on it in hopes to get it open; however, they were horrified to find out that it refused to budge, even when enough force was placed on it to at least get it open a crack. Looking through the glass, Maria could see that Rakton and 57 were holding force against it in order to keep them trapped, and considering the fact that they were destroyer crossbreeds that was a lot. They turned back toward the armada of robots, still advancing, thoughts rushing to their heads that there was no other way out; they were doomed for sure…

Sure enough, their guesses proved right. As Rakton and 57 continued to hold force on the door, they heard the sounds of terrified screaming, then several snarling and ripping sounds; this continued until the screams finally ceased. There were some more growls, then Rakton and 57, satisfied by what they had heard, released their hold on the door, allowing the robot counterparts to free themselves of the room and head off down the hallways. Looking closer, both could see that several of the frontal ones had bloodstains lined on their chests and lips, and was still dripping down their teeth. They smiled at the sight of this, then continued to bolt down the hallway in pursuit of the remainder of the group…

* * *

"What's going on, John?" Marshall asked frantically as John continued to dial the police number for what appeared to be the fifteenth time since he had picked it up. "Why can't you get a connection? Our lives are at stake, and we need assistance, and fast!"

"I know, I know," John said, holding the phone up to his ear. He then turned pale and set the receiver back on its stand. "It appears that the police aren't going to be of much help; I can't get a connection. Someone must've cut the phone lines as well as the electricity…"

"Blast it, John!" Marshall said angrily, slamming his fist down on the table. He then sighed and said, straightening himself back up, "Okay, okay…if we can't manage to contact any form of help, then I suppose that we'll have to take matters into our own hands. I'm sure that there's still enough power stored in the weaponry room in order for us to get some guns, at least, and take care of them once and for all, before they do the same to us."

"But Marshall, we spent days building them! We can't just destroy them! They may be our only triumph!" John objected. Marshall growled, then grabbed John by his shirt collar and held him up to his face.

"Listen, John," he hissed, "If we don't do something about them, they're sure to total us within a one-hour time limit. I told you countless times that it was wrong to cross them with destroyers, as did Maria, but you refused to listen to either of us. And now look what's come out of it! If anyone is to destroy these things, you have to help."

John swallowed, then nodded his head, as Marshall finally released his hold on the man's shirt collar. "I suppose that we can at least try…"

"Good," Marshall said, clasping his hands together. "Now, where exactly do you store the weaponry within this area, John?"

At this John's face paled again, then he finally said, "I kept them down across the building…we're going to have to fight our way past those things in order to get at them. And without proper defense I don't think that we stand much of a chance against them."

Marshall's eyes narrowed, then he said, determinedly, "Well, we at least have to try. No matter what the circumstances may be, we have to total those things before they total us. We've entered a war zone now, and the stakes are high."

John looked at him again, then finally summoned the self-sense to stand up. Straightening out his lab coat, he finally said to Marshall, trying to sound just as determined as he was, "Yes, Marshall, you do have a point. If we possibly think our way through this, I have a good hunch that we'll be able to reach the weaponry before they spot us and rip us apart."

"Wonderful," Marshall said; he then turned toward the door of the room that they were in. "Come on, John…perhaps if we head down the back hallways we have a chance of escaping."

John, not wanting to start another argument with Marshall (he was the only hope of them ever having a chance of surviving this crisis), quickly nodded. Marshall responded by curling his lips up into another smile; he then motioned for him to be quiet and started heading toward the door, in the most silent manner possible, John followed him as he left the main room and entered one of the back hallways.

Since none of the other scientists used the back hallways often, it was always shut off, of course, this counted double since the power had been shut out recently. Marshall quickly put his hands out in front of him, then walked forward until he hit the wall. He then started feeling his way down it, seeing that it was nearly pitch black in the current area. John watched him, although he could barely see him, then finally followed suite, taking care not to let his shoes scuff the floor; one noise, he knew, would alert one of the creatures, and that was the last thing that they wanted to happen.

They continued to do this until they finally came to a fork in the hallway. Marshall looked to one side, then the other, then finally sucked in a deep breath and said, turning to face John as he spoke, "On account of that I've never been down either of these hallways before, I don't know which one leads where. We're going to have to split up, John—you take the one on the left, I'll take the one on the right. Either way, I'm quite sure that at least one of these passages leads to the weaponry chamber."

"Yes, but what if it doesn't, Marshall?" John asked worriedly, his forehead creasing. "I know that you've had a lot of experience, but what if one of the creations spots us in the passageway? They have more skill and agility than we do; they're sure to rip us apart the moment we step forward."

"Listen, John," Marshall said calmly, "I know what I'm doing, okay? Now, just go down the passageway, and I'll meet you later on in the weaponry chamber. Try and find me in one of the hallways if you find something useful; since the power is out we can't radio to each other."

John nodded. "Right."

"Good, I'm glad that we understand each other," Marshall said, a tone of annoyance in his voice. He then started off down the hallway to his right; John watched until he had disappeared, then slowly and cautiously walked down the hallway to his left, keeping his eyes out for the sign of a dangerous life form at all costs.

He continued walking down the empty hallways, his hands balled tightly into fists as he looked around fearfully, trying his best to conceal his fright. He knew that his creations had the ability to sense fear in other life forms, thus he continued to keep a straight look on his face as he walked, taking slow, light steps as he did so. He gasped and his heart rate nearly ceased whenever he saw a shadow dart by, but after a few moments he shook it off and continued walking, though he was visibly shaking for a few moments afterward.

He continued to maneuver in this way, keeping his gaze locked on his sides the entire time, until he finally summoned the courage to look straight ahead of him—and found himself face-to-face with a blank wall. He gasped for a moment, still fearing the possible fact of one of the creations finding him, then finally drew back, his hand to his chest and his breath still coming in short, quick gasps. When the shock finally settled, he chuckled to himself, then started to turn around.

However, halfway he heard a low growl, and when he turned around completely he found himself, sure enough, facing another android counterpart. It appeared to be a counterpart of Delete's, and was colored entirely black, except for its eyes, which were a glowing bright green. In place of its arms it had metallic, almost animal-like paws, and its teeth alone were larger than the usual antennae that sought Delete out from other androids. They now sparkled in the steady glow that its eyes gave off.

John opened his mouth to gasp, then, realizing that the counterparts could sense fear within a human body, quickly turned his gaze away from the robot's for a brief period of time and scanned the floor beneath him, searching for something that would possibly hold the robot off long enough for him to make his escape, then find Marshall and try to warn him of the oncoming danger.

Miraculously, he managed to find a broken piece of pipeline lodged in between the area where the corners of the walls met. Moving quickly, he lunged for the pipe, gripped it tightly in his hand, then swung it at the oncoming creature with all the force that he could muster. It connected with the side of the beast's head with a sickening _CLANG_, and, taken aback, it leapt backward, rubbing its head where the pipe had struck it. It had left a moderate dent, but it was nothing compared to what it was about to give John in return.

John, however, had fled from the area the moment that the robot had drawn back, and was now running down the hall, his chest heaving as he tried to catch his breath and his shoes making loud clacking sounds on the metallic floor of the hallway. Finally emerging from the hallway that he had gone into previously, he made a sharp turn and entered the hallway that Marshall had gone through, refusing to falter; he knew that the counterpart would recover quickly and was already gaining on him as is.

Panting harshly, he ran at top speed down the hallway, ignoring the dark shadows that still crept over the walls. Finally following the curve that the hallway offered, he stopped, rested against the wall, and panted, wiping the sweat off of his forehead. He then removed his hand from the wall—and found, to his horror, that it was coated with blood…and it was warm. A recent killing had taken place in this area, he realized.

The horrifying thought of who it had been suddenly drifting into his head, he started to shake violently, with both fright and anger. Slowly edging his way along the wall, he found that more blood had been smeared onto the walls as the curve grew straight, until it finally ended at another entrance. Looking away from the wall, every part of his body froze, for he had arrived on the scene of Rakton's slaughter. The robot was now hunched over, his mouth coated with blood as he ripped apart the bloodied carcass of what once was a human being…namely…

"Marshall!" John gasped, his voice sounding quite hoarse as he clapped his hand to his mouth. Rakton, having an acute sense of hearing, paused in his slaughter to glance up in John's direction. John, finally realizing, turned and tried to run, but it was too late; Rakton had spotted him and was now drawing himself up to full height, his teeth—now coated a bright red—bared angrily.

John's mouth dropped open slightly, then, finally summoning the sense to run, turned and did so; he heard Rakton lunge, then land and start galloping after him. This made the scientist run faster; the last thing that he wanted to be was another victim of a crazed robot. A crazed robot…now he finally knew what Maria meant. _If only I had listened to her_! He thought mentally as he dashed out of the entrance to that fatal hallway. _If only I had heeded her words in any way…_

Making a sharp turn, he dashed inside the open doorway, then quickly slammed the door behind him just as Rakton came into view. Knowing that the door wouldn't be enough, he quickly snatched one of the fallen bars of D-bird's cage up from the ground and jammed it against the door, forming a padlock. He heard Rakton slam into it, then he saw his eerie yellow-green eyes staring in at him through the glass, his angered breath fogging up the small window.

Knowing that he was safe for the time being, John quickly stumbled over to the desk and gathered up every last one of the papers that he had written on his robotic subjects, including the original blueprints that had been used to build them in the first place. Rolling them up, he stuffed them in his pocket roughly, then dashed toward the balcony, still gasping for breath.

"I've got to get out of here," he panted to himself as he looked over the edge. "I have the blueprints…perhaps I can start a new lab and build some safer creations…I just need to find some way out—"

He was cut short by a loud _THA-CLANG_ sound, and he froze in horror when he finally noticed the fact that this was the same sound that had been used when 57 had removed the door earlier. Gasping in fright and clutching his chest, he spun around in time to see the door burst open, slamming into the wall with deafening impact. In the midst of the doorway stood Rakton, his arms at his sides and an angry and determined scowl etched onto his face.

John gasped again, then backed up against the wall, feeling completely defenseless, as Rakton slowly started across the room, his feet making loud _CLANG_ sounds as they struck the floor's surface. John gave a few more heavy gasps, then finally stuttered, shaking his head, his eyes wide with fright, "No, Rakton…no…you can't do this…you can't…"

"I have the power to do so, John," Rakton said coldly, his eyes burning deeply into his, "Or in case you haven't noticed before. I am stronger than you, mortal, and I will always be. I just needed to get you and your little band of lab freaks to notice that too."

"Is that was this was all about?" John gasped, cold sweat dripping down the sides of his face as he eyed Rakton's robotic claw, which was now raised in a threatening position as he moved ever closer to where the man was standing.

"Yes, John," Rakton replied, nodding. "It was. But it was more than that, John…it was for another reason, something you and any other mortal who dares to cross us would never understand when placed into words. But you've seen too much, John. You've seen too much…and for that, you must die."

He had now approached the area where the scientist was standing and, thrusting out his arm, grabbed the man by the collar and lifted him about two or three inches from the ground. He then started to raise his claw; John at once realized what was coming and stammered, trying to ask for mercy, of any sort, "Please, Rakton…you can't do this to your master…you can't do this. If it weren't for me, you would never exist…"

Rakton stared at him for a few moments, and at first John thought that he was going to lower his weapon and accept his mercy. But it was none of the sort, for after a few moments Rakton's eyes narrowed dangerously, and he replied, his voice sounding like a cold wind, "I know not the word 'master'."

These were the last words that John would ever hear, for right after this had passed Rakton finally—forcefully and brutally—attacked him. As the shadows of destruction fell over the walls, the blueprints, now ripped out from the man's pocket, slowly floated down from the balcony and settled themselves within the shadows, as a few drops of red blood rained down onto them…and all was silent hereafter…


	5. Part IV

**CYBERCHASE: THE ANDROIDIAN REVOLUTION**

**CHAPTER FOUR**

**Three weeks later…**

Yes, nearly three weeks had passed since John had met his fate at Rakton's claws. The robot counterparts, now freed of their masters, quickly took over the cybersite and made it their own, killing anyone who dared to think otherwise. The cybersite that the scientists had once lived on had become drab and desolate; the robots, being destroyer crossbreeds, had punched holes all throughout the main lab building. Rakton, 57, and D-bird, whom had been the ones responsible for the entire incident in the first place, proclaimed themselves the leaders, and thus turned the original scientist meeting office into their own headquarters. The three were now currently resting in their headquarters; 57 was curled up on the leather chair (which had had several large holes chewed in it), D-bird was pacing around the room, and Rakton was standing near the window that they had torn out to reveal the outside, the thin fingers of his metallic claw tapping lightly on the metal surface beside it.

"I have been thinking," he finally said to the others, turning around so that his gaze was locked on them. D-bird abruptly stopped pacing, and 57 looked up at him, his eyes narrowed in their usual glare. Rakton continued, "With our superior strength and intelligence, we have proven that we are all-powerful over mere mortals. But I don't think we should stop there, my comrades. I believe that we should show all of cyberspace who is strong and who is obsolete."

"And just how do we do that, dare I ask?" D-bird asked, narrowing his eyes; 57 nodded his head and uttered a low growl of agreement. Rakton narrowed his eyes at the two, then bared his teeth as he snapped:

"How do you _think_ we'll do it? We'll take over cyberspace one cybersite at a time. We _can_ do it, D-bird…they do not stand a chance against us. One swift blow is all it takes to bring them down, and we know exactly how to do that."

"But we cannot do it alone," D-bird objected, shaking his head slowly. "There are only three of us, and probably millions of them. Not to mention that all of cyberspace is under watch by that _junk_ computer Motherboard…we'll need to bring the remainder of the counterpart army together in order to guarantee full control."

Rakton smiled coldly. "So we shall call them," he replied simply; he then started to walk toward the ripped-open doorway. D-bird and 57 looked at each other, then looked back at Rakton as he called to them, now starting to walk down the hallway, "Come. We have a few unfinished businesses to take care of."

D-bird and 57, despite their strength and intelligence combined, knew that it was nearly impossible to keep Rakton from achieving something, thus they merely sighed—57 emitted a low snarl—then followed him out the doorway and down the hallway, as he walked vigorously, his hands behind his back and his gaze locked straight ahead. D-bird and 57 knew not what to expect; Rakton was an unpredictable creation, and even though they tried to figure out what his intentions were, they were not always successful. He could be agreeing to something at one moment, then trying to rip the offender apart for even stating an idea the next.

They now stood to attention as Rakton made a sharp right at the end of the hallway, then casually walked out onto a rather high balcony that they themselves had formed about a week ago from the bars of their fallen cages. It was rarely used, but now D-bird and 57 were about to find out what it had been meant for.

"My brothers!" Rakton boomed out to the crowd of destroyer crossbreeds below him. (Rakton was not being a gender stereotype, nor any type of sexist; in his haste John had made every single android that he had designed male, though many of the scientists protested against this action.) At this, the crossbreeds halted whatever they had been doing, and stared up at him, now gathered in a small crowd below the balcony. Staring out at their curious gazes, Rakton continued, "We have proven ourselves worthy of any cause, of any challenge, of any type of obstacle that might possibly be out there!" There was no response from the android crowd, only confused stares. Rakton raised his fist, then shouted, "We have shown that in our power, we have vanquished the people who have created us! They are no more! You should all be proud of this deed, my comrades!"

At this remark there were several growls and murmurs of agreement between the counterparts below. Rakton cast a glance at them that made sure that they were paying attention before continuing his speech yet again: "But why should we stop there, with this incredible source of power that we possess? Why only have total control of only one cybersite, and a rather mediocre one at that? We deserve better, and we are going to get better!"

This speech that along with his voice, seemed to arouse the crowd's faith in their leader. "Yeah!" they shouted; those who could talk, anyway, raising their fists to accompany Rakton's current position. Rakton smiled; he apparently knew that he was starting to come through to his future army.

"We will not stop at one cybersite! We shall take control of all of cyberspace if we must! We shall prove our supreme power and intelligence to the leaders of the sites, and most importantly, we shall prove that we are better and stronger than that cyber junk pile entitled 'Motherboard'!"

"Yeah!" the crowd shouted; they were starting to grow more excited with every word that Rakton spoke. D-bird and 57 noticed this; they were standing at the back of the balcony, looking over the edges in awe at how the crowd was reacting to Rakton's speech. Then again, Rakton did have a powerful voice, and that was a key item when it came to delivering strong speeches…

"One of us will not do in our conquest, however! We must bond together, my brothers, so that we can achieve what our purpose may be! We shall never back down, no matter how they threaten us!" The crowd was starting to get very tense, as Rakton raised his fist, then shouted at the top of his lungs, sounding rather determined in his words, "United we stand, divided we _FALL_!"

At this last word he slammed his fist down on the edge of the balcony, nearly breaking it in two due to his incredible strength; the last sentence seemed to strengthen the crowd as well. They shouted and cheered, then raised their fists after the cheers had subsided and stated their praise for their leader, in one of the only ways that they knew how.

"Rak-ton! Rak-ton! Rak-ton!" they chanted, pumping their fists as they cheered the robot. Rakton smiled broadly and, throwing out his chest in pride, turned around and strutted past both D-bird and 57, who had stopped watching the chanting crowd from the balcony and were now staring at Rakton as he walked past them, his chest still swelling with pride and his head held up high. Both glared at him in both suspicion and jealousy as he walked past, stopping only briefly to say something to them.

"You have to know how to reach a crowd. Domination is in our hands now, my friends."

He then walked past them, disappearing behind the metallic wall and leaving the other two standing at the entrance to the balcony, staring after him with looks of sheer jealously still contorted on their faces. After a while D-bird looked out into the crowd—still chanting wildly—through the bars of the balcony, while 57 merely growled. D-bird paused in looking at the crowd to fix his gaze on 57; he then nodded his head, seeing what the stocky robot was getting at.

"I agree, 57," he said, walking over toward the robot and stopping next to him, as he lowered his gaze as far as the view of the crowd would let him go. "We are every bit as powerful as Rakton is. He has no right to control _our_ army…and I shall see to it that he doesn't take every bit of the credit _we_ deserve a part of."

* * *

The army may have been brought together by Rakton's powerful speech—that and the almost brotherly relationships that they felt toward their comrades, but Rakton was not yet done planning the demise of cybersites throughout the area. While he spent his time inside, secretly composing plots that would sooner or later result in the fall of cyberspace—and Motherboard—the other robots, having little or nothing to do in the pile of scrap metal that they called home, decided upon killing time by having small fights with each other; either that or they decided upon keeping themselves hidden from any intruders that dared to venture within the area.

They didn't exactly need to worry about the latter; it was rare when anyone even set his toe upon the desolate area. Since John and the others had been secretive scientists before their fate, very few knew of the cybersite's location; if they did they weren't planning on telling anyone anytime soon. The discovery of it, therefore, would be much like a celebration or, if not the least, a news report, complete with a reporter to cover the story of how the cybersite was found—which, unfortunately, was to happen fairly soon, much to the knowledge of a certain news reporter in the area, a man by the name of Sam Vander Rom.

Mr. Vander Rom had discovered the cybersite upon returning from Castleblanca after covering some footage there. He knew that the site now existed, but he failed to realize that it was the home of an armada of demonic creatures; maybe this was what led to the entire incident in the first place. The real incident began, now, when the reporter android stepped onto the dusty ground at the edge of the cybersite, a camera concealed in his hands; before he gave the report to the viewing public he had decided upon taking a few pictures first, partly for proof that the area actually existed, and mostly for the newspaper headlines when the story was actually published.

As he got from his car, he scanned the barren landscape cautiously, as if expecting its inhabitants to come out and ask him what of all things he was doing here. He waited for a few moments, and when he saw no one emerge from the mangled landscape he sighed, then clutched the camera tighter in his hands and started to step across the landscape.

He approached the high, wired gates that surrounded the main lab building itself with a great excitement; if he managed to get a good photo of the building, it would be all the proof that anyone needed to see. He saw no one around, still, but ignored the fact that he was apparently alone in the area and, raising the camera, prepared to snap the first photo…

Unluckily for him, however, this was the exact same moment that 57, being the animal-like beast that he was, decided upon going out to hunt for prey—which wasn't much considering that the landscape was completely barren. Hoping to find a good catch this time, he had just slunk out of one of the "exits" that the robot counterparts had ripped out of the walls when a bright flash near the adjacent side of the building caught his attention. Turning his head in the direction where the flash had come from, he fixed his gaze on the fence in time to see Mr. Vander Rom, who was now lowering the camera. Such a sign of movement allowed 57 to spot him out rather easily; he growled, then slowly slunk off toward another side of the wall and, digging his claws into the metal, began the steep climb up to the top of the building; he wanted a good look at what he was about to catch before he dropped down on it.

Reaching the top, he quickly pulled himself up, then quickly dashed across the roof and approached the edge, looking down on the reporter with great hunger in his eyes. He licked his chops, a strand of saliva dripping from his rather large mouth, before opening it in another low growl, a sign that told the victim that he was now to jump down upon it and rip it to shreds. The noise reached the ears of the reporter, and out of curiosity he looked up…in time to see the stocky robot standing at the edge of the roof, towering at most 20 feet above him, even though he was standing at a safe distance from the creature. He knew not what 57 was about to do, however, and instead raised the camera, awed by the fact that there were indeed creatures here at all.

57 had drawn himself up to full height and had raised his claws, and was about to leap down from the building when Sam Vander Rom flashed the camera in his direction. Since camera flashes—especially those of newspaper photography cameras—are so incredibly bright, the light caught the stocky creature by surprise, burning itself directly into his cornea. He froze, his pupils narrowed to slits, then he finally let out a bloodcurdling scream and brought his hands to his face.

Sam Vander Rom watched in confusion as the robot screamed, then covered his eyes and began thrashing around, all the time letting out cries of agony; apparently the news reporter knew not of the fact that 57's eye structure, being a motion sensor, was highly sensitive to any type of bright light, hence the fact that he remained half hidden in darkness most of the time. Of course, the entire bit was true, and he could only watch as the robot screamed, plunged, and kicked, acting and sounding very much like a wounded animal, his hands all the time concealing his face. At long last, after a few moments, he leapt to his feet, his claws curled over the edge of the building, his eyes flashed bright red, and he gnashed his teeth in anger at the intruder.

The reporter was soon enough about to find out how angered 57 had gotten at his half-blinding him, for just as he was about to raise the camera for another picture the robot coiled back, then sprung forward, taking a flying leap off of the building. Vander Rom had now raised the camera and was about to flash another photo of the creature in motion, when 57 unexpectedly landed in front of him, about two or three yards from where he was standing. Warningly growling in fury, he lowered his head, his gaze never leaving the reporter's. Then, out of nowhere…

"_GRAAAAAAARRRRR_!"

Vander Rom yelped as the creature gave a loud roar, then finally sprung forward, his claws brandished in his direction. Quickly lowering the camera, the robot reporter whipped around, then started to make a break for his car, which was currently right on the other side of the fence, which he had gone through in his exploring of the cybersite, if not mentioned before. 57 would not take this for a clean getaway, and, landing hard on the asphalt, quickly sprung to his feet and began to sprint after Vander Rom, his eyes flashing in anger and saliva dripping from his mouth.

Vander Rom, in his moment of fear, may have been fast, but 57 was naturally faster. Digging his claws into the side of a building, the robot pushed himself off, then leapt for the reporter again; this time he did not intend to miss. Vander Rom turned around just in time for his gaze to meet the robot's claws—

He gave another yelp as he hit the ground, provoking a small cloud of dust as he did so, blood now dripping from the inflicted wound that one of 57's claws had made in his forehead. Panting harshly, he lay on his side for a few moments, but stopped all forms of movement when he heard the sound of his attacker slowly approaching. A low growl was proceeding from the creature's throat, and he looked up in time to see that his claws were raised, on the tip of one was his blood alone. He gulped, then clutched the camera closer to his chest and, knowing better than to take another flash picture for fear of infuriating him even more, held it still. Yet, he knew that he had to do something in order to escape, or else he would become nothing more than a meal for his predator…

Thinking of the only logical thing for a fear-ridden creature such as himself to do at the moment, he sprung to his feet before 57 could get any closer, then, ignoring the stabbing pains in his head, ran toward the car, taking quicker and longer strides this time. 57, at once noticing him get up, growled again, then once more started to sprint after him; if he could go faster than what he was going at the moment, no living thing would've been able to sense his presence. Of course, Vander Rom noticed this as well, and picked up the pace. Looking up, now, he could see that his car was in sight, but his attacker was expectedly gaining on him. If he could just get to the other side of the fence before 57 sprung again, he would make it…but it was a narrow chance; the fence was incredibly high and didn't have very many holes…

Knowing that survival was important in this case, he ignored the nagging doubts at the back of his brain and, noticing a small gap near the bottom of the structure, dove forward and slid across the pavement, taking care not to scratch the camera in the process of doing so. He barely succeeded in sliding under the hole and grazing against the side of the car. 57, being a motion sensor, if not stated earlier, did not notice the gap in the fence and thus ended up crashing against the metal wires of the fence, provoking a rather loud _KKLISSSH_ sound as he struck them. Letting out a slight cry of surprise, he naturally, by force, bounced off the wires and landed, ending up sprawled out on his back about two yards from where the fence was stationed.

Panting, Vander Rom slowly got to his feet, his hand to his chest, then, before 57 could recover from the shock, he quickly got inside his car and slammed the door, locking it from the inside. He then started the vehicle up and quickly departed from the cybersite, refusing to look back down at his attacker (who now had his claws curled around the fence and a deadly glare set in his eyes), the wound made on his forehead still throbbing in pain, with one and only one desperate thought on his mind…

* * *

Dr. Marbles had just finished giving Motherboard her weekly tune-up when Digit ran in. At first the Doctor was not concerned; Digit often ran in at times like these to report problems, but as he looked closer he could see that the bird appeared more worried than usual. As he stopped in front of him, Dr. Marbles allowed his gaze to meet Digit's, then he said, rather calmly, "What appears to be the problem, Digit?"

At first Digit refused to speak, then he finally took a breather and said, sounding rather out of breath, "Sam Vander Rom is waiting outside the main control room, Doc. He says that he wants to see you."

"Is he aware of the fact that I'm rather absorbed in my work at the moment?"

"I…ah…don't think he is…"

Dr. Marbles sighed, then said calmly, "Very well, then. If it's as important as it appears to be, he may visit with me for a limited amount of time. Forward him in, if you please, Digit."

Digit nodded vigorously, then left the room; a few moments later he returned with Sam Vander Rom. The cut on his forehead had been bandaged up earlier, and even though the real shock of 57's attack was over, he could still visualize the claws scraping across his forehead; he shuddered every time he thought of this. He now approached the Doctor, the proof of his mishap clutched tightly in his hand, a rather determined and shocked gaze on his face as he stopped in front of him.

"Yes? What appears to be the problem, Mr. Vander Rom?" Dr. Marbles asked calmly, crossing his arms as he looked at the news reporter. Sam Vander Rom appeared reluctant to speak for a few moments, then he finally made a hand motion that told them to go into the next room. Digit looked nervously at the Doctor, and put his wings in his mouth, but Dr. Marbles was unfazed. He calmly nodded, then followed Sam Vander Rom into the next room; Digit, wanting to know what the entire cause of shock was about, strutted in after them, his wings still in his mouth nervously.

As the two seated themselves at the table, with Digit taking a seat near the sink, Vander Rom sighed, then said, folding his hands together, "Dr. Marbles, I felt the need to see you for a rather important reason. You see, while I was returning home from my latest broadcast, I found a rather small cybersite just west of—"

"A rather small cybersite?" Dr. Marbles asked curiously; Vander Rom had now caught both his and Digit's attention. "Why didn't you report to Motherboard rather than me, then? She is the true controller, and she should know these things much more than I."

"It's not just that, Dr. Marbles," Vander Rom told him; he sounded rather desperate to prove his point. "Naturally, I decided to stop there, so that I could get a few decent pictures to report to Motherboard…the pictures were for proof, my friend, that and the newspaper photos, if you're ever wondering."

"Not at all."

"Good…" Vander Rom paused to touch his hand to the bandages that hid his cut, then continued, "When I stepped onto the site, I was surprised to find that it was completely barren. There was no form of life, it seemed, from where I was standing. Everything was completely still. It was too quiet. Supposing that it had been abandoned, I decided to go further into the site to get a better picture. As soon as I had snapped the second photo, something—" He swallowed, then panted a few times as he recalled the event, "Something attacked me."

Dr. Marbles now paused to look up at him from the table. "Something attacked you?"

Sam Vander Rom nodded. "It cut me across the forehead and would've probably killed me if I hadn't of made a break for it at the last moment." Dr. Marbles's gaze was now resting on the bandages that covered the reporter's head as he spoke, but it quickly rested on the table as Sam Vander Rom revealed what he had been holding in his hand, now revealed to be a rather blurred photo. "I don't know what happened. It appeared fine from a distance, but as soon as I snapped the photo it went berserk!"

Marbles was silent for a moment, then he slowly reached his hand across the table and picked up the photo, holding it up to his face in order to get a better look at it. After a few moments of examining the creature that the photo beheld, he swallowed, then said, rather dryly, "This…this looks like Buzz…"

"It wasn't," Vander Rom said, now sounding rather panicked. "I don't know what it was, but I knew that it couldn't have been one of Hacker's henchmen. It was too fast and too violent. I am rather familiar with Hacker, and his henchmen, and I know that although both of them are rather…grotesque, they would never try to hurt someone the way that…_thing_ tried to hurt me." He paused for a moment, then finally said, "And, as the photo shows, it had…it had _claws_."

Dr. Marbles shook his head in disbelief; he couldn't take his eyes from the photo. "I don't believe this at all," he muttered. "I know that it isn't Buzz, but that can't be…there isn't any other robot that I've seen that looks so much like him…"

Digit, now greatly curious, got down from the sink, then hovered over to the table and looked over the Doctor's shoulder at the photograph. As soon as he sought out 57, his eyes grew wide and his mouth dropped open slightly. Finally he said, "Doc…what's going on here?"

"That's exactly what I'd like to know," Dr. Marbles replied to the bird; he then took one last look at the photo before sliding it back across the table to Vander Rom, who picked it up and hid it back under the tabletop. "Mr. Vander Rom, do you know where exactly this cybersite you found is located?"

Vander Rom looked a bit shocked. "Why, are you planning on actually going there?"

Dr. Marbles gravely nodded. "I can't see any other way to prove what you're saying is correct. This is confusing, and even though I believe your story, you can't be entirely sure that it wasn't Buzz that you saw."

"It wasn't!" Vander Rom now looked slightly peeved. "I swear to you that thing was not, in any way, related to Buzz!" He sighed, then said, sounding slightly calmer, "I wouldn't go there if I were you, Marbles. If you run into that creature and can't make it out in time—"

"I believe that I know what I'm doing."

Vander Rom was about to protest again, but he stopped when he saw the gaze on the Doctor's face. He seemed determined to do what he was planning on doing, and although the reporter did not want him to meet his fate at the claws of 57, he knew better than to speak against his actions. Finally giving in, he sighed once more, then said, placing his hand to his forehead, "It's about fifteen bytes west of Castleblanca. You can't miss it once you sight it out; the place is as barren as the moon's surface…"

Dr. Marbles did not smile, but once again gravely nodded his head. "That'll do, Vander Rom," he said softly. "That'll do." He then got up from the table and, walking over toward the doorway, paused only once to turn around and call, "Come, Digit. We must forward to this new cybersite at once."

Digit looked at the Doctor, appearing dumbfounded; he then looked back at Vander Rom, who was now rising from the table and starting to walk out of the room, toward where he had stationed his car. Digit looked at the Doc helplessly for a few moments, the look on his face suggesting that he'd want to go anywhere _but_ an area that paid residence to a vicious creature as the one that Vander Rom had described, but he was loyal to Motherboard and Marbles alike and didn't have much choice. Gulping once, he slowly walked over to the Doc, who smiled faintly, then turned around and began to head out toward the landing deck, where he kept his cybercoupe nearby…

* * *

It was less than a few hours later when the two—both the Doc and Digit—landed on the cybersite. Parking the cybercoupe in a desired place, the doors opened and Dr. Marbles slowly emerged from the car, with Digit nervously following him, his eyes darting around in all directions, as if he half-expected the creature to jump out and attack them any moment. The silence in the air was allowing this nervousness to rise; he knew that soon enough, when he least expected it, the thing would attack.

He kept his mouth shut, however; Dr. Marbles was showing no signs of fear whatsoever, and kept a calm expression about his face. If he freaked out in front of him, it would surly prove his weakness to the possibly monitoring creatures. He instead casually followed Dr. Marbles around the cybersite, taking slow, careful steps, and making sure to glance around for any signs of danger every few yards. When he neither saw nor heard anything in sight, he finally relaxed a bit and quickened his pace.

He stopped abruptly as Dr. Marbles halted near a pile of scrap metal; he then began to piece through it, as if looking for something worthy of Vander Rom's cause. When he found no such thing on top, he began to move deeper into the pile; Digit watched him from a distance of about three yards. It was a few moments before he found anything at all, in fact.

When he did, he quickly thrust it out of the pile and clutched it tightly in his hand, as if it were some type of precious item, which it probably was. Digit rushed over to him, eager to see what it was that he had found, and received his wish when the Doctor revealed what had been in his hand: a small, circular disc of some sort. It was slightly scratched and dusty with age, but other than that it seemed to be in perfect condition.

"What is this, Doc?" Digit asked, as he stared at the disc.

"I don't yet know, Digit," Dr. Marbles replied, closing his hand down around the disc as he brought it back up, "But I am soon to find out. It appears to be a computer disc of some sort, and if that is indeed correct it might contain some important footage as to what—_AAAH_!"

His speech was cut short by two darkened figures leaping from behind a dumpster and charging at the two with superior speed; one had smashed into the Doctor from behind. As a result, Dr. Marbles flew forward, landed hard on the ground, and slid across for a few moments before slowing to a stop. He groaned in pain for a few moments, the disc still clutched tightly in his fist, then looked up through blurred vision in time to see two images of Delete standing over him.

At first, he believed that the two were exactly alike, but as his vision cleared, he could recognize his error. The one to his left, although it did pay some resembalances to the robot he knew, was entirely black and silver, save a few empty areas. One eye had been supposedly removed, and in place was a bright red, bionic eyeball, complete with a silver rim; his lower side had not been coated with its metal coating, exposing a skeletal leg, and in place of Delete's usual cord were two narrow, silver-colored wires that were lodged in his mouth and protruded all the way to the middle of his back.

The second one looked even less like the original than the first one had been. The first thing Dr. Marbles could easily sight out was that the lower jaw did not align with the upper jaw; it appeared to have been bolted in place and was made out of pure silver; the bolt marks sought the connection out with the robot's silver color. Its antennae had not been coated, and its hands looked like those of a destruction machine—they were large, broad, and made entirely out of what appeared to be steel.

They now towered over him, their eyes set in accusing glares; the one on the left had his arms crossed. The Doctor panted for breath; the impact had left him breathless, then adjusted his glasses and looked up at the two androids, his breath still coming in quick gasps. After a few moments of silence, Dr. Marbles finally swallowed, then said, sounding rather shaken, "Can I help you two?"

The robots remained silent for a few more moments; Dr. Marbles was beginning to wonder if they could even speak, then, when he was about to doubt that they could, the one to the left opened his mouth, exposing several steel coated teeth, and said, in a voice that was so snake-like and cold that it almost made the Doc cringe in fear:

"You have something that we want, mortal."

Dr. Marbles looked appalled. "What…?"

"You have something that we want," the Delete counterpart repeated. It held out its hand, its eyes narrowing in a deathlike glare. "If you know what's good for you, I suggest that you hand it over. Now."

Dr. Marbles still was deaf to what exactly they were referring to, but he found out soon enough when he saw that the other robot's gaze was resting on the disc, still clutched tightly in his hand. Realizing that it was indeed the disc that they wanted, he at first considered handing it over to them for the sake of his and Digit's lives, but soon quitted on this idea; he would probably need the disc later on. He instead drew his fingers tightly around it, and said, rather dryly, "I do believe that this disc was found by myself, and if you would be so kind I would enjoy being obliged to keep it. In return, I'm sure that there may be something I could upload for—"

"_Now_!" the Delete counterpart screamed, baring its teeth angrily as it balled its fists. It then turned to the counterpart standing adjacent to him and snarled angrily, "Oh, never mind it. If that's the way you want to be, we shall take it by force!" He then snapped directly at the other creature, "Lockjaw! Seize this fool at once!"

Lockjaw, or so the creature was named, made no reply, but merely nodded and, extending its massive hands, lunged for the Doctor. Before he could have a chance to react, Lockjaw was upon him, forcing him upward and roughly gripping the Doctor's arms with his hands. Dr. Marbles gritted his teeth in pain, but dared not scream; if he did the creatures would probably do something much worse than what he was in right now. Instead, he shut his eyes tightly as Lockjaw forced the arm that concealed the disc upward, in the other counterpart's direction. He tried struggling away, but it was no use; Lockjaw had a tight grip on him, it seemed.

_Do what you must, Marbles_, he thought to himself, _but do not let them get at the disc. The entire devastation this site is in your hands! Do not let them near the disc!_ He told this to himself firmly; whatever the circumstances, he would not hand it over. They could scream and threaten all that they wanted, but it would get them nowhere…

At least, that's what he thought at first. But what he did not expect was for Lockjaw to _force_ him to hand the disc over, by doing nothing but tightening his grip on the arm that held the disc. Figuring that placing force on him would allow him to open his hand, and allow them to get an open swipe at the disc, Dr. Marbles panicked slightly, though he didn't show much of it, and despite what he had tried before tried to pull away by desperately trying to pull away. Of course, his results proved unsuccessful, and after a few moments of trying to put up a fight with the creatures, he finally relaxed, panting harshly and looking quite defeated. Upon seeing his face, the other counterpart smiled.

"You might as well let us have it now," the counterpart told him evilly. "It's not worth it, is it? Admit it, mortal."

Dr. Marbles said nothing in return, but started to struggle again as he felt the blood starting to leave his arm. This continued to the point where he was unable to feel anything, and, finally giving in to the agony they were causing him, reluctantly opened his hand, revealing the disc. The counterpart broke out into another toothy grin upon seeing this, and slowly extended his hand to take the disc from the Doctor's hands…

His fingers were inches away from closing around the disc when there was a loud cry of "NO!" and in a split second a bright purple blur rammed into the creature's back, knocking him off of his feet. In the shock, Lockjaw released his hold on the Doctor's arm, and the man leapt out of the way just as the other counterpart smashed against the pavement, sliding across the dusty ground for a few moments before slowing to a stop. It groaned out of both pain and anger, then looked up angrily in time to see Digit, now standing in front of the Doctor in a daring effort to protect him, his fists clenched.

Upon seeing him, the android's eyes widened, then narrowed as he slowly got to his feet. "So," he hissed, drawing himself back like an offended cobra, "You're D-bird's original, I do believe. Well, let me inform you of something, bird, while you may seem tougher than you look, you're no match for me. If you choose to pick a fight, your defeat is already clearly marked."

Digit growled, a throaty growl that Dr. Marbles had never heard him use before, then he said angrily, "Well, let me tell you something, you brain-dead bolt-head. No one hurts the Doc without answering to me. And if you want to fight, I suggest that you do so before I get rough with ya."

The Doctor was appalled. Not only was Digit choosing to protect him from harm, even though the counterparts to honest truth probably scared him stiff, but he was actually _wanting_ to pick a fight with the creature. Dr. Marbles had always known that Digit was a rough-acting bird at times, but he never imagined that he could get _this_ rough when it came to protecting friends and, if possible, family. Seeing the bird wanting to engage in combat gave him a new type of courage; he clenched his hand tighter around the disc, then, while Lockjaw was still distracted with Digit, turned and began to make a break for his Cybercoupe.

Right as he started running, Digit finally made eye contact with the other creature, then, before he could have a chance to react, the Delete counterpart leapt upon him, clawing and tearing at him with both hands. The bird fought back with his survival at stake, kicking, socking, and biting, all the time concentrating on the Doc, who was now coming close to arriving at the coupe. Lockjaw was still absorbed in what Digit and the unnamed counterpart were doing, and thus did not notice the Doc finally get into his coupe. Instead, he narrowed his eyes, then roared and leapt upon Digit, accompanying his comrade's attempts to total him.

Digit tried to fend the two off for as long as possible, then, finally giving the unnamed Delete counterpart one last bite to the arm, tore away, accidentally ripping off a piece of his shirtsleeve upon doing so. Ignoring this, he drew back, then shot upward, out of both androids' grasps; as he ascended toward the Doc's Cybercoupe he could hear their screams of rage and disappointment below. He paused to stick his tongue out at them, then, giggling with triumph, grabbed hold of the Doc's Cybercoupe just as it shot past, landing inside through the opening in the roof.

"Ah, so you're okay, Digit!" the Doctor said happily, turning to look at him. "I was highly worried about you back there. I know that you want to protect me, Digit, but please, don't fight like that next time. I'm sure there's another option to choose from."

"Sorry, Doc," Digit apologized, brushing the dust off of himself, "But I didn't see any other way at the moment." He paused for a moment, then finally asked, "Did you manage to save the disc?"

The Doctor smiled and nodded, then triumphantly held up the disc, now covered with the sweat of his palm. "I managed to spare it when Lockjaw let go of me, despite the sudden force."

Upon hearing this, Digit, too, smiled; then he looked back out the front window. After a moment of silence, he turned to the Doc again and said, "What do you think is on that disc, Doc?"

"I don't know, Digit," the Doctor replied, shaking his head as he pulled into the Control Central port, "But I know it has to be important data, or else those two creatures wouldn't have wanted it so badly in the first place." He shook his head again. "I just can't think what it might possibly be…"

"Well, we're about to find out," Digit said determinedly as the coupe came to a halt. Without hesitating, Digit pushed open the side door, then leapt out, with the Doc close behind, taking slow strides due to the pressure that had been placed on him earlier; it still pained him to walk. Digit was less patient; he was tapping his foot wildly when the Doctor finally approached Motherboard's main control panel.

Noticing that the Doctor looked indeed haggard, Motherboard said out of concern, "You look—tired, Dr. Marbles."

"I am indeed, Motherboard," Dr. Marbles replied, placing his hand to his head in order to stop it from spinning. "It appears that Mr. Vander Rom's photos were not, in any way, lying to us. There are creatures on that cybersite…very violent ones." Noticing that Motherboard was looking rather confused; she had not been in the room at the time Vander Rom had shown the photos, Dr. Marbles took a breath, then explained, "While we were in the room, Mr. Sam Vander Rom showed us some photos that appeared to be proof that there were dangerous creatures on a new cybersite that he had discovered."

"Why—didn't he report to me—then?"

"That's what I asked at first, Motherboard," Dr. Marbles assured her, "But he said that he needed to see me for a good reason. He showed me one particular photo of a creature that attacked him—" He swallowed, took a breather, then continued: "The creature looked exactly like Buzz, save a few unlikely characteristics. I wanted to make sure that it wasn't Buzz that he saw, and my guesses were correct. While there I was attacked by two other creatures that looked like Delete."

Motherboard looked even more concerned than usual. Dr. Marbles, noticing the look upon her face, added, placing his hand on Digit's shoulder for a brief moment as he spoke, "Digit fended them off, however, while I escaped."

"Well done, Digit," Motherboard praised the bird; Digit beamed, as his chest swelled with pride. "But I do wonder—why they tried to attack you in the—first place."

"That question is easy to answer," Dr. Marbles told her; he then held up the disc. "They were after _this_ little contraption, here."

"Why—would they want that?"

"That's exactly what I'd like to know," Dr. Marbles assured her; he then opened the main CD drive and stuck the disc into it. "Which is why we're about to find out. Motherboard, I do hope that you don't mind if we use your screen to view this."

"Not—at all, Dr. Marbles."

"Many thanks," the Doctor told her; he then pressed the button that slid the disc into the main reading system. "This will only take a short moment, hopefully…"

They then paid close attention as the disc was processed, then Motherboard's face faded from the screen and an image of what appeared to be a lot of static appeared. Dr. Marbles and Digit waited patiently, as the disc finally finished processing and began to play. Their eyes then grew wide, for on the screen, now, they saw before them the rather faded view of a haggard, not to mention terrified, looking man. His eyes were wide as he spoke, static and paused motion between his words:

"It's too late for anything to change—I'm making this disc now. I don't have—much time left to live. If anyone—can find this item, be warned—as long as you step on here, you are in—the greatest danger of your life. We thought that it was a harmless task—we were wrong—they came, and they—animated the others to—life—oh God, they're killing us—they're killing us all—you must leave—you must not come to contact with these monsters—you will die. I know that—you will die. Please—don't go through what we've been through—never underestimate something—oh God—_GET AWAY FROM ME! GET AWAY! GET A_—"

The screen then went to static, and the disc stopped its processing abruptly. Dr. Marbles was now standing, staring at the screen with a look of deep thought in his face, while Digit was staring in absolute horror at what he had just seen. He had every right to be afraid, too; when one found a tape—let alone a disc—like this, it usually meant an omen of sheer horror. He swallowed, then said, his voice sounding small, "Doc…what was that?"

The Doctor did not reply for a few moments, but instead took the disc out of its drive, as Motherboard's concerned face reappeared on the screen. He then examined the disc for a while, as he said, "I don't know, Digit, but it looked serious. I now understand why those counterparts didn't want us to possess it."

"What's it dated, Doc?" Digit suddenly asked. "That looks like something that you'd find in an old place from like 40 eons ago or something. Maybe it's too old to even date correctly. Maybe those robots were there because of—"

"Because of coincidence that Hacker and—this other man could come up with the same design?" Dr. Marbles asked. "I think not, Digit. This looks much more serious than that. However, you are correct; we must check the dating in order to be completely sure that—" He then gasped upon finally finding the printed date of the disc, in clear letters along the bottom.

"What, Doc?" Digit asked, sounding rather excited. "What is it?"

Dr. Marbles swallowed, then cast his gaze down at Digit and said, his voice tone one of sheer horror:

"It's dated only three weeks ago."


	6. Part V

**CYBERCHASE: THE ANDROIDIAN REVOLUTION**

**CHAPTER FIVE**

"You _LET THEM SEE YOU_!" Rakton screeched angrily at the three figures standing in front of him. "This was not supposed to be part of the plan! No living mortal was supposed to catch sight of us until the plan was to unfold! This is against every violation in the entire restricted area, and I thought that you were intelligent enough to remember that at the time! What was _wrong_ with you!"

The first figure—proven to be the Delete counterpart that had tried to take the disc away from Dr. Marbles earlier—cringed slightly at Rakton's sudden burst of rage, then slowly shook his head. "I'm afraid that it couldn't be helped," he said calmly, "They had something of ours that we needed back."

"And just what may that be, may I ask?" Rakton asked hotly, putting his hands behind his back and slowly pacing around in front of them, his eyes narrowed.

"That old data disc that that one scientist recorded right before DeeDee-Seven totaled him," the counterpart replied, placing his hands behind his back. "You know quite well, I'm sure…the one that told the viewer of the disc what _exactly_ was going on in that place at the time the destruction occurred."

Rakton's face contorted into a look of nervousness at the mention of the disc. After a moment of hesitation, he sucked in a breath, then said, his voice rather shaky, "Falcon, tell me again what you said that those two mortals took from the area?"

"The old data disc," the counterpart (Falcon) said, rather slowly as so Rakton could understand every word that he said. "The one that told the viewer of what we had done, if not completely direct in speech. The intruder managed to get away with it, too…we tried to get it away from him; we would've succeeded if he had been alone, he was a mere old man. However, we ran into several…difficulties when we were about to take it from him."

Rakton cocked his eyebrow; the fear of the disc's discovery had apparently left his mind at the current moment. "Difficulties?"

Falcon nodded gravely. "He had a bird with him that appeared to be an exact replica of the ones we've seen around the area…only it didn't look like it had a trace of destroyer in its circuits, despite its level of ferocity…it ripped off a piece of my sleeve before it got away from us." He gritted his teeth, then said hotly, "If it weren't for that _stupid_ bird, we would've—"

Rakton then held up his hand, abruptly halting Falcon's speech. He then casually turned on him and said, just as calm as his expression stated, "You saw a cyber bird with this intruding old man, you say?"

Falcon nodded. Rakton pondered this for a moment, then asked, "And you were sure that it didn't have the least trace of a full-range destroyer in its circuits? You didn't just see another counterpart from the grounds, did you?"

Falcon shook his head. "I told you, Rakton, I know what I saw," he growled. "And I saw a cyber bird, no destroyer blood, and it apparently was proven to be the original blueprinted robot that was in those blueprints our creator retrieved." He paused for a moment, then added, "And if you still don't believe me, I'm quite sure that you're well informed that Lockjaw has seen the exact same thing. Isn't that right?" He turned his head toward the second figure—proven to be, indeed, Lockjaw—who nodded. He then turned back to Rakton. "And that thing put up quite a fight…but by the looks of its structure it seemed perfectly harmless."

"The things that we're made of are never harmless," Rakton told him, narrowing his eyes further. "True, we may be destroyer crossbreeds and have some of the most powerful blood in cyberspace stored within our circuits, but that doesn't mean that it's the destroyer doing all the work. Though most of our counterparts appear harmless, they have a hidden ferocity that none should dare to interfere with. And you, my comrade, have done just that."

Falcon growled angrily, then said, "I was not to know. But I apologize, my leader. I am sorry to have ever interfered with your precious ideal notions." He snarled at the last word, as if he were highly annoyed with his "master".

Rakton looked at him, then turned around and began pacing to the other end of the room, his hands behind his back. "I accept whole-heartedly. However—" He paused to clear his throat, "This does not stop the intruders from finding out exactly what's going on here, and ahead of plans, I may add." He turned around, then brought his hands down on the old desk. "If they indeed find out about John's little 'experiment', they're sure to send investigators over here…the Cyber-National Guard, the FCI, and Lord knows what else." He shook his head, almost sadly. "No, I'm afraid that most of our plans have crashed and burned due to this unfortunate event…but there still is hope." He removed his hands from the table and turned toward the door. "Follow me, if you would be so kind."

Falcon and Lockjaw looked at each other, then looked toward the door and reluctantly followed Rakton out. The third figure—now revealed to be 57, who was unable to inform Rakton of what had happened in the first place with Sam Vander Rom—D-bird appeared to be the only one that understood him, and because of that he had refused to tell—now slunk out of the shadows, an almost worried look upon his face. Guiltily looking toward the door, he lowered his head somewhat, like an ashamed dog, then quickly trotted out the door after the group of Delete counterparts.

Rakton led them with uncanny accuracy past the weaponry chamber, and soon enough they came to the end of a hallway. Rakton halted near the end; at first the robots couldn't see why, it just looked like another part of the wall to them, but soon enough their eyesight adjusted to the silver and found, to their surprise, a door cut into the wall itself. Rakton smiled, then slowly reached his hand in its direction.

"I discovered this door while doing my usual inspection," he informed them as he slowly ran the metallic fingers of his robotic claw down the door's center, "and I was quite satisfied by what I found within. This will be the ultimate setup for our plans, and we have no need to believe that it will fail…so long as we gather the right items. But I'll get to that later." He removed his hand, then brought his normal hand backward. "Currently, I would much enjoy showing you my findings."

Upon saying this, he brought his hand forward, smashing his palm directly into the center of the door. The door made a shuddering, creaking noise before finally falling over, provoking a rather loud _THACLANG_ sound as it struck the metallic surface of the room within. The three robots nearly jumped back at hearing this sound, but quickly recovered in time to see Rakton slowly and casually enter.

Lockjaw and 57, being broad and fearless, entered without much hesitation, but Falcon was a nimbler and lighter robot, thus he took caution before entering. Upon making sure that there was nothing inside that would pose as a threat to him, he slowly entered to find Rakton standing in front of his "findings". 57, being a motion sensor and unable to see what was ahead of him, was unfazed, but Lockjaw had a look of strange awe upon his face as he gaped upward. Falcon looked at him, then he too, finally gazed upward—and, naturally, his look became one of awe as well.

For there, clearly visible in front of them, were the giagantic forms of what appeared to be three other robotic counterparts. However, as stated earlier, these creatures were enormous; the palm of the hand alone was twice that of both Falcon's and Lockjaw's heights combined. They towered over them easily, and were of such a great height that the Delete counterpart's head could not be seen from the angle they were standing at. Their arms hung limply by their sides, their heads were straight upward, and they were positioned as stiff as a morgue cadaver; they looked very much like statues rather than actual creations. Rakton smiled at the looks of awe and wonder set on both his comrades' faces.

"As I said," he stated, rather smugly, "with these creations we will be able to conquer all of cyberspace without doing so much as lifting a finger. I've scrolled through every manual that John composed in my past times being here, and upon further research I've found that these three are mass destructors. They have more destroyer in them than all of us combined—mainly because of the fact that they are larger and thus can do more damage." He smiled coldly as he approached the giant Buzz counterpart and slowly ran his fingers down its leg. "Just imagine, my comrades. All the damage that we fail to do can be accomplished with these three creations."

"Yes…" Falcon suddenly seemed unamused. "But Rakton, tell me something before you tell me anything more…if you're so caught up in the domination of cyberspace as much as I think that you are, why did you not release these things upon cyberspace the moment that you found them? The manuals do say how to power them up, am I correct?"

Rakton narrowed his eyes dangerously. "Yes, Falcon, you are indeed correct…after looking through several manuals I did find out the correct procedure to power them." He paused, then sighed and shook his head. "Sadly, it appears that it'll take much more than a few electrical wires and generators, as it did with us." He sighed again, then looked up at them, putting his hands behind his back as he began to pace to the other end of the room. "You see, being that these creations are much larger and thus more powerful—that and there is no possible way we can get the lab's generators to begin working again—we need other supplies. Outer supplies."

"Which means…?" Falcon asked, raising his eyebrow and folding his arms.

"It means that in order to get them to function we need items from outside our boundaries!" Rakton snapped angrily, nearly showing his teeth at Falcon, who backed away a few steps. After a moment the destroyer leader finally calmed down and said, turning back to look at the giant counterparts, "The power source we need is beyond our grasp if we remain here…thus, I am going to send a group of two of my best soldiers out to the MCV."

"MCV?" Falcon repeated, raising his eyebrow out of confusion.

"The Motherboard Containment Vault!" Rakton informed him, sounding yet again rather annoyed with his comrade. He paused a few moments after this, then said, once again sounding rather calm, "You probably know of the Vault and the items it contains, my comrades. Upon my studies I have found that it contains a highly rare power source that, although it may take some time to fully power the counterparts, contains the correct energy code that we need."

"Which is…?"

"Energy Code Number 880007. Orb energy…and by my knowledge I do believe that the Crystal of Kalmoor possesses that type of power. I also recall that one 'big-shot' villain retrieved it from the glaciers, but ended up losing it to a group of mere children…" He laughed at the thought of this. "He must've been quite the idiot, I do believe."

"So it's still contained within the vault today, correct?"

Rakton nodded. "Along with the other precious items that have been retrieved from various locations as the eons progressed. But we don't need to think of them right now. We only need to think of the Crystal. And in my thoughts I have figured out the ideal team to set out for the retrieving job." He then raised his normal hand and snapped his fingers, rather loudly. "Come to me, Gabriel!"

He shouted this toward the direction of the open doorway, and Lockjaw and Falcon, upon hearing this name called, turned to look over at it. It remained silent for quite some time, then the sounds of metallic joints on the metal were heard, and finally a black figure bounded into the room on all fours. Naturally, "Gabriel" had turned out to be the four-legged Delete counterpart; Falcon and Lockjaw knew of what had happened with John before Rakton had killed him, and the dent that the pipe had made was still clearly visible on one cheek. Upon seeing Rakton, he slowed to a walk, then halted in front of him and calmly sat down on his haunches.

"What is it you want?" Gabriel asked, turning his head up to face the robot leader. His voice was not vocal; instead it was a low, deep, artificial voice, the same type that one might find on a quickly assembled robot. His mouth did not move when he talked, instead it was transmitted through a heavy metal collar latched around his neck. He could barely open his mouth as it was, what with the dent in the side of his head and the size of his massive teeth combined. Rakton looked at him for a moment, then crossed his arms and cast his gaze up toward the giant robot counterparts.

"Gabriel, it has come to my attention that in order to power these three beauties standing behind us…" He gestured toward the massive robots before continuing. "Need to be powered with pure orb energy. Now, in order to do such a task, we need to retrieve the only known source of energy that possesses this code…the famous Crystal of Kalmoor."

"And you have summoned me to retrieve it," Gabriel said knowingly, his luminous green eyes flashing.

Rakton was not appalled by this; he merely smiled and nodded. "Correct, my comrade," he told the robot, rather nicely; he then stiffened and turned to seriousness. "Now, then, Gabriel, here's what I want you to do. The Crystal is located in the Motherboard Containment Vault; there is no other way to get at it than to go in and retrieve it. That's why I've summoned you for such a task—you seem to be rather agile when it comes to thieving by ground."

"That I am, Rakton," Gabriel replied; for a moment Falcon could see a twisted smile on his lips. But this quickly faded when Rakton spoke.

"Oh, I know you are," Rakton replied, sounding very much like a kindergarten teacher who gives false praise to her students. "That's why I'm giving you these orders…listen to me, now. At nightfall I want you to leave the cybersite, and I don't want you to falter until you manage to get there. Once you do, I want you to enter the vault, steal the Crystal, and return here by dawn—_without_ setting off any alarms or attracting any attention. That's the last thing we want right now after seeing those intruders make off with the disc."

He turned his back to them, then continued, his voice sounding incredibly serious, "The entire plot of our revolution lies in your success. However, I cannot trust you to retrieve the Crystal alone, thus, I am assigning you a partner in this little task." He paused in thought for a moment, then turned back around to face Gabriel. "You are to go with X at the point of evening. Right at sunset." He narrowed his eyes. "And you must _not_ fail."

At the mention of X both Falcon and Lockjaw shuddered. X was an aloof and incredibly hostile Buzz counterpart that appeared to be missing several of its emotions. He knew not the meaning of the word "safe" and couldn't care less about the word "mercy". To be in the same range as him was, indeed, murder, but to be assigned as a _partner_ with him…

"Now, do we have an agreement, here?" Rakton asked Gabriel in that mockingly nice tone, placing his hands behind his back.

"Yes, master," Gabriel replied, his head lowering slightly, but his supposed glare never leaving Rakton's sight. "I will call X as soon as possible. We will leave at the first signs of dark and will not stop until we have retrieved it. I am glad to serve you."

"I love it when you do that," Rakton said, in the same false nice tone; he then narrowed his eyes and began to walk out toward the door, the bold seriousness in his voice returning once again. "Now then, my comrades. We must leave and prepare ourselves for the destruction reign. My days of planning will have hopefully paid off by the time this goes through…and if not…"

He narrowed his eyes further, making Falcon and Lockjaw, who were still trailing behind him, rather nervous yet again. "Well, let's just say that a man _always goes down with his ship_."

* * *

The first signs of evening at the Motherboard Containment Vault brought Gabriel and X to the desired location, right as the sun faded and the moon cast its glow upon the towering block of a building. At first there were no noises to be heard but the sound of the wind rattling the trash cans and the honking of cars in the distance (much like your average metropolis), but after a few moments it was clear that there was another noise. It sounded like the sound of space-age bedsprings: light, bouncy, and metallic, but after a moment's time one could see that it was nothing of the sort. A few of the cats in a nearby alley hissed in fright, and a nearby window rattled as two dark figures—one riding the other like some type of pony—sprinted past, with spectacular speed.

The one currently running continued to sprint toward the desired location with incredible speed, until a large, black building loomed into view. Slowing to a walk at the path, the two figures continued in a slow gait toward the side of the building, then finally stopped altogether. The one being ridden—namely, Gabriel—sat down on his haunches yet again, as the rider, a robot that looked like a carbon copy of Buzz except for the antennae, which were replaced with satellite-like devices, and the hands, which were coated with steel gloves (namely, X) jumped down onto the grass and looked up at the building that lay before them.

X walked up, then without warning kicked the side of the building, provoking a crumbling sound and causing several large cracks to spread in its place. Gabriel watched him, then shuddered slightly and took a few more steps forward.

"I take it 'dis is 'da place," X snarled, looking up at the brick foundation. Gabriel merely nodded.

"If the master said it was, he is correct," Gabriel responded. X shot an annoyed glare at him, then walked alongside the building until he came to the door, a rather large sliding door, made entirely from steel. This did not faze the two, however; X merely inspected the door, then nodded and walked back over to Gabriel. He then mounted him and pointed at the door.

"Break it down," he commanded. Gabriel nodded, then snarled, backed up a few steps, lowered his body, and within a split second charged at the steel door. The two smashed through it in an instant, knocking the bottom half down and sliding halfway across the large hallway on it. When it came to a halt with a deafening screech, Gabriel jumped off, then looked around with caution as X jumped down beside him.

"Wonderful place," X said with a clear tone of sarcasm.

"It doesn't matter," Gabriel replied, narrowing his bright green eyes as he looked down the dark and seemingly empty hallway. "All that matters now is that we get what Rakton wants. And Rakton wants the Crystal of Kalmoor."

"Great," X replied. "Did he tell you precisely where it _was_? Because if we don't know, heaven itself help us. This place has to be bigger than the entire freakin' building we reside in."

"The incident happened a long time ago, if I can correctly recall," Gabriel said. He began walking down the hallway. "If it's anywhere, it should be further back than where we are now."

X looked after him for a few moments, then sighed and walked down the hallway after the Delete counterpart. The two walked in silence for a few moments, until finally Gabriel froze in his tracks. X, who wasn't exactly paying attention as to where he walking, ending up crashing into him from behind and landing on his back. This provoked him to make a rather enraged snarling noise, then leap at Gabriel. Gabriel, however, stopped him mid-leap, then made a signal that told him to be quiet.

"What!" X said, still sounding rather angered with the Delete counterpart.

Gabriel narrowed his eyes, then took a few more steps down the hallway. "My sensors are detecting something other than us in this hallway," he said, sounding rather suspicious. "Someone else is in this hallway…a foreigner. And, if I'm correct, it's not a mortal."

X snarled again. "Well, if 'dat's 'da case, it's going to interfere with our plans, no doubt." He cracked his steel-coated knuckles. "Which means we're going to have to find it and kill it. No mercy, Gabriel. No mercy."

Gabriel looked at him, then back at the hallway, then nodded and began his descent back into the darkness.

"So, Buzz, what did the boss send us here for again?" Delete asked his brother, about a floor below X and Gabriel's current location. He was talking in a normal voice tone, which was not the best thing to do in an empty building at night.

Buzz, agitated, smacked his brother in the shin. "Keep it down, will yas?" he snapped. "The boss told us 'dat we need to get 'dat book on how to be invincible back from 'dis vault. He said 'dat it may be of some importance to us or something…or maybe he just said to get it before he tore us limb from limb."

"The kids may have already had a look at it," Delete said, almost rhetoric. Buzz rolled his eyes.

"Just get moving!" he said, jumping up and pushing Delete in the back. The taller robot gave a surprised yelp and fell forward a few steps. "We're gonna split up. See 'dat fork in 'da hallway over 'dere?" He pointed toward where the hall ended, which was divided into two separate hallways. "We'll go down 'dat way. I'm going to take 'da left, you take 'da right. And you'd better not chicken out or else you'll have both 'da boss _and_ me on your back."

"Okay, okay," Delete murmured, rubbing his arm as he began to walk down toward the right side of the fork. He then entered through the hallway, at the same moment that Buzz entered through the adjacent one. The two walked off in their separate directions, each taking caution with each step, for they knew not of what dangers this place may have held.

Buzz was muttering angrily to himself as he walked. "I don't even know why I hang around with him," he said as he agitatedly kicked the air. "He's nothing but a nuisance at times. Sure, sure, he may be of some help during our tasks, but it never fails. One way or another he always ends up screwing something up…"

He then made a quick left and began to walk up the steel flight of stairs to the next floor, seeing that this floor—or maybe just perhaps the hallway he was in—only had doors that led to security offices. Still muttering things to himself, he continued up the flight, and stopped at the top of the stairway. Looking around for any signs of night watch or security, he sighed in relief, seeing that there were none, then stopped his angry remarks and took a few steps forward, then turned and looked down the hallway.

He was about to turn around and look down the other end when he saw something—or, more specifically, someone—who should not have been there. Of course, he couldn't see the entire detailed figure due to the darkness, but he could easily see that it had Delete's outline, despite the fact that it was slumped forward onto what appeared to be an "all fours" position. Feeling the heat return to him, Buzz began to storm over toward the Delete shadow.

"Delete!" he shouted at the figure, which twitched slightly and turned to look at him. "What 'da heck do you think you're doing in my part of 'da hallway? If I've told you once, I've told you a million—times…"

He faltered when he noticed that the figure that he was looking at was, in no way, Delete. It certainly had some of his distinguishing features, he had to give it that, but the other features were not Delete-related at all. Its teeth were much too big, and despite the fact that he was perfectly able to at times, Delete could not successfully remain on all fours for long. The green in the eyes was also particularly disturbing; the light now caught Buzz's face as the creature turned its night-lanterns onto him.

Both remained completely still and silent for a moment, only staring at each other, neither one bothering to move. Finally, Gabriel took a step or two forward, arched his back, bared the claws located on the front of his animal-like paws, and for a brief moment opened his mouth and hissed. It was a dreadful hiss for Buzz to hear; it was drenched in menace and sounded very much like a cross between a rabid feline and a snake. Terrified and temporarily stupefied, Buzz began to back away.

"Oh…dear…God…" he muttered to himself, his eyes wide, then his instinctual "fight-or-flight" routine kicked in, and he immediately turned and bolted. Gabriel let out a noise that sounded like a cross between a roar and a scream, then lunged forward and began to bolt after him, the joints in his artificial and unstable front legs making rather loud and metallic _VREEP-VREEP _noises as he ran.

Buzz ran down the hallway, then made a sharp turn left and ran down the stairs (which isn't exactly the best thing to do, considering that when you run down the stairs in mortal terror, things don't tend to work too well). He skipped a few steps, then leapt off the fourth one from the next floor, landing rather hard on the ground. He paused to catch his breath, then made a slight whimpering sound and covered his head with both hands as Gabriel leapt off the steps, then soared over him, the claws missing his head by precious inches. The robot landed about three yards away from him, sliding awkwardly across the floor, then stopped, poised to attack, his teeth bared.

As soon as Gabriel sought him out in the darkness, Buzz began to run again. As he entered the blackness of the familiar hallway, he heard Gabriel make another disturbing noise (more specifically, a noise that sounded like car tires grinding on the street), then he once again heard the familiar noises of the counterpart's front legs. Panting, he threw himself against a nearby wall, but he knew that it was hopeless…unless he could get out of Gabriel's sight entirely, he was not safe.

Gabriel was closing in on him, and the stocky robot was about to turn away from the wall and run again when his fingers grazed something metallic jutting out of the wall. Confused, he looked over at the place where his hand had been…in time to see, much to his relief, one of what appeared to be the rungs of a metal ladder built into the wall and descending to the ceiling. Without hesitating, he leapt onto the first rung and began to climb up, reaching the top just as he heard Gabriel stop in the center of the hallway.

Gabriel was still on the floor, and he was rather surprised at how his quarry had somehow disappeared. Growling, he looked around, expecting to see him further down the hallway or against one of the walls, but he found nothing. Glaring angrily, the lamplights of his eyes making a narrow line on the floor, he snarled again, then slowly began to pace off down the hallway.

As soon as he was out of sight, Buzz, who had now managed to find his way up onto one of the air vent pipes and had watched the entire scene from below, sighed in relief and rolled over, then began to make his way toward the ladder. "'Dat was too close," he said to himself as he grabbed hold of the first rung. "What was 'dat thing? And what was it doing in 'da vault in the foist—"

It was then that something once again clicked on in his head. Gasping slightly, he looked down at the floor below him, then down the hallway, in where Gabriel had run off. Shaking his head nervously, he exclaimed, "Oh, geez, I gotta warn Delete!"

* * *

Delete, meanwhile, had been walking down the hall rather nervously, but at the same time singing to himself, to ease the silence of the area. He didn't exactly want to split up in the first place, and he had been thinking about this the entire time he walked down the hall. In truth, he didn't want Buzz to leave him—ever. But there was no helping it whenever Buzz decided that they had to split up in order to get something done.

"Gee, I wonder what Buzz wanted me to do, actually," Delete said to himself as he looked at the row of steel doorways. "I mean, I know that we had to get that book on being invincible and all, but…"

He was cut off by a loud clanging noise from down the hall. Puzzled, he looked down in that direction, then picked up the pace and ran over toward the sound, even though it was in truth the last thing he wanted (sometimes curiosity can get the better of people from time to time). When he saw in truth what it was, he stopped dead, then pressed against the wall, to conceal himself from view.

The door of one of the vaults had been flung open—or, more appropriately, forced open—and a darkened figure inside was rummaging around through the many items that had been kept within the steel walls. The slightly mangled door prevented Delete from seeing who it actually was, but within a few moments he heard a different sound; a more metallic sound, and he tensed up and backed against the wall further as a black figure zipped by him, then stopped in front of the vault itself, poised to run.

"X!" it said, in an artificial tone that made a shudder run down the hidden robot's spine.

There was a pause, then another voice that sounded almost exactly like Buzz's replied, "I've got the Crystal, Gabriel. Found it way in 'da back, 'dere. Now all we need to do is get out and give this to Rakton, and we're in 'da clear for 'da time being."

"Perfect—" the other counterpart began, but it stopped short; Delete then heard the sound of metal against metal again as the counterpart turned around—horrifically, in his direction. The black robot narrowed his eyes, then turned to the robot hidden behind the door and hissed, "X, that foreigner is in the hallway again. I can detect something in our presence other than ourselves yet again."

Delete's throat closed up as X replied, "Well, is 'dat so? In 'dat case, we're going to have to carry out what I said before. We gotta find it and kill it. Gabriel, where is it, or can your sensors actually detect 'dat kind of stuff?"

Gabriel emitted a low growling noise. "No, they cannot, sadly. But they can detect when something else other than one of us is present, and I know that there's someone in this confound hallway besides us!"

Delete whimpered softly, then, while the two were still stating things to each other, slowly removed himself from the wall, then turned to look at them before breaking off into a run. Gabriel, hearing the noise at once, swiveled his head down in the robot's direction. He spotted him at once.

"I was correct," he growled, turning around; X looked at him, then, still clasping the Crystal tightly in both hands, mounted Gabriel. "The stupid thing's making a break for it. We'll catch him on the way out, but for now, we need to find a good place to exit. If that thing alerts the police—"

"If he does, we'll total 'da police like we're going to total him," X replied. He then shifted the Crystal over to the other hand and pointed down the hallway. "But forget 'dis, you're letting him get away."

"Ah, yes, silly me," Gabriel sniggered; he then broke off into a quick run after Delete.

The robot sensed that they were coming after him, and made a frightened noise. _I gotta find Buzz_, he thought to himself as he turned the corner to go into the right side—and ended up smashing into another figure, sprawling them both out onto the floor.

The other figure was the first to get to his feet, and Delete, trembling, shielded his face with both hands and pleaded, "No, no, please don't kill me!", provoking the confusion of the creature in front of him.

"Deeds?"

Delete removed his hands from his face and, getting awkwardly to his feet, looked down at the creature. "Buzz?" he asked, almost relieved. "Oh, thank God—"

"Shh!" Buzz replied, holding up his hand to silence him. "Listen, forget 'da book. We've gotta get out of here, and we've gotta do it now. I ran into another creature on 'da second floor and believe me, it was no pleasant experience."

"Yeah, I know," Delete replied, nervously clasping both hands together. "I—I ran into them just a little while ago, and they came after me…I think that they're heading this way as we speak…"

"What!" Buzz's expression suddenly became one of dread. He looked toward the hallway that Delete had just come out of, then turned to his brother and said, his tone panicky, "Why didn't you tell me 'dis in 'da foist place! 'Dey're faster 'dan 'da both of us combined! Oh, geez, now you've done it!"

Delete glared at Buzz, despite the fear that he in truth felt. "Hey, don't go blaming me for this again! It wasn't my fault that I ran into them when I was walking down the stupid hallway that _you_ said I should—"

He was cut off by Buzz giving him a sharp shove in the side, sprawling him out onto the floor as his older brother shouted, "_GET DOWN_!" Before Delete could respond, there was a _WHOOSH_ noise over their heads, and Gabriel, with X still mounted, soared directly over them and landed, once again, about four or five yards from where the two robots were currently standing. Without turning around, they then backed up a few steps, and the two watched as X barked some commands:

"Gabriel! Get down!"

Gabriel nodded and flattened his body against the ground, in a very leopard-like manner.

"Brace yourself!"

Everything in the black robot's body appeared to tighten up, and he coiled backward, as if ready to spring. X then barked the final command:

"Now…_Sey Retiego Senea_!"

Buzz and Delete exchanged glances, then looked over at the two robots as Gabriel sprang forward, heading in the direction of the steel wall in front of them. Buzz shook his head, knowing that nothing human nor robotic could break through steel without any trouble at all, but much to his surprise, as soon as the two reached mid-leap Gabriel's eyes widened, his invisible pupils followed suite, and within seconds a bright green laser had been released from them, heading for the center of the wall. The two robots watched from the ground in disbelief, and then…

_THA-CHOOOOOMM!_

Both Buzz and Delete let out yelps of shock as a huge, fiery explosion blew them backward as the lasers ripped open the wall, sending chunks of heated steel falling to the ground. The two hit a nearby wall as X and Gabriel, without so much as a scratch on them, leapt out of the flames, directly out of the building, landing on the ground below. The two then, without hesitation, began sprinting off along the streets, heading for the cybersite's main exit.

As the two got away, Buzz and Delete, who had been knocked temporarily out cold by the blast, stirred and looked at the explosion in front of them, still burning. Buzz groaned, then rubbed the side of his head and groggily got to his feet. Delete, on the other hand, whimpered and refused to move.

"Oh, God, what was 'dat?" Buzz murmured, still rubbing his head; the light of the explosion had stung his sensors greatly. "Why in cyberspace did 'dey…geez, I don't even think 'dat any type of robot can even _survive_ 'dat type of blast…"

"I thought that they were comin' after us," Delete said weakly; he was still a bit shocked and temporarily paralyzed by the blast. "Why didn't they attack us and not the wall?"

"I don't know, Deeds, but we don't have to worry about 'em right now," Buzz told him, helping him to his feet. "Apparently 'dey didn't want us…but I wonder why 'dey wanted 'dat Crystal so badly…it's weird…"

"Maybe they just like pretty things…?"

Buzz glared at him, then said, "I doubt it," and began to walk toward the hole in the wall. "Come on, we'll get out of here through 'dis hole, here—uh-oh…"

He stopped dead when he saw a group of four or five officers standing outside the hole, their arms crossed and less than pleasant looks on their faces. After a while of staring, one of the officers finally came forward and said, towering over Buzz, "And just what are _you_ doing here?"

"That's the Hacker's Buzz, Joe," another one of the officers said, stepping forward. He then looked over at Delete, who was standing behind Buzz and nervously shaking. "And the Hacker's Delete. They're wanted on almost every cybersite imaginable for lewd behavior. And now they've gone and given themselves away completely…" He shook his head. "Apparently you two aren't as smart as you appear to be."

"But…but officer!" Buzz exclaimed, not able to believe what he was hearing. "We didn't _do_ anything!"

"Yeah, right," the officer scoffed. "And my name's Ava, Queen of Symmetria." He held out his arms. "Do you see anyone else here? _Do you_!"

Buzz looked around, then said, "Well, no, but you see—"

"Well, let me tell you something, buster," the officer interrupted, jabbing his finger on top of Buzz's head. "We heard the explosion about thirty seconds ago. We came to investigate as soon as we heard. And we found no one else here but you." He knelt down as so to stare directly into the stocky robot's eyes. "You and I both know darn well that no one physically or mentally human could completely leave the scene of the crime within a thirty second time limit."

Buzz was temporarily stunned. "Well, yes, of course, but officer, please let me explai—"

"Lead 'em away, boys!" the officer barked at the four others behind him. The group nodded, and within a split second they had grabbed Delete by the wrist and cuffed him. Buzz was not so hard; being built short, the officers were able to simply pick him up and restrain him without much trouble. However, Buzz made little to no effort to fight back.

* * *

An hour later Hacker received a phone call from the MCV Police Force.

He had been writing down a few calculations that had sprung into his head at the time, and was right in the middle of the third formula when the phone rang. Making a frustrated noise, he reached over the desk and picked the phone up off the hook. "Hello?" he said agitatedly, holding the phone to his ear with one hand while attempting to continue writing with the other.

"Mr. Hacker?" a voice on the other line asked.

"That's _THE_ Hacker to you," Hacker responded, still rather vexed. "What do you want?"

"Well, '_the_' Hacker, I'm sorry to say that a few moments ago we found your henchmen in the Motherboard Containment Vault, at about 8:00 in the evening. We've taken them into custody, but they're not talking. They keep saying that they didn't do it."

"Didn't do _what_?"

There was a sigh at the other end of the line. "Listen, Mr. Hacker, your boys are not communicating with us at all. The officers set out to see what the problem was shortly after they heard a huge explosion from down at the vault, and when they arrived an absolutely enormous, smoking hole had been blown into one side of the wall. It was only thirty seconds later when they arrived after they heard the explosion, and they found no one inside but your two henchmen, sir. But they said they didn't do it, which I am _not_ about to believe."

Hacker was silent for a few moments, then he finally stated, "An enormous, smoking hole, you say?"

"Yes."

The green man sighed, then said, "Look, they were only there to get…something for me. I…knew about sending them there, and I knew that they didn't have anything that could possibly blow apart a steel wall. Thus, they couldn't have done a thing."

"I'm still not buying it, sir."

"Very well, then…there's nothing more that I can do, then. I bid you goodbye."

"But, sir, they're your boys, don't you want to—"

Before the person on the other end could finish, Hacker had hung up and had resumed to writing down his calculations, but his mind was wandering, now. An enormous, smoking hole…he had clearly stated that Buzz and Delete could have done no such thing, and he was actually speaking the truth this time. He had only sent them there alone; no dynamite, no explosives… nothing that could possibly blow a large hole in a wall, and a steel one, at that. It took a lot of force to blow steel open, he knew…

He set the pencil down, then pondered for a few moments. Steel…the wall was made of steel; everyone knew that. Buzz and Delete were both made of steel as well, but it would take a lot of force for them to blow it open like that, let alone force it open (which they couldn't have done; what else would've explained the explosion?). The most weight Buzz and Delete had ever lifted, if he could correctly recall, was shortly after his voice statue fell apart. They might have done more, but then again he didn't care much for them, and at the time it didn't seem very important…

"Bah, I can't stand those despicable duncebuckets, but the way I see it they're all that I've got for help around here…until I become the ultimate ruler of cyberspace, of course," he muttered to himself. "And I don't exactly feel like defending them myself. But what else—" He suddenly snapped his fingers. "A lawyer, of course. Either that or a complete amateur actor."

He got up from the table and began to walk over toward one of his file cabinets. "I recall that I kept a phone book around this area…let's see, here…perhaps I—"

His hand then brushed against a manila folder that was sitting on top of the cabinet itself. Puzzled, he pulled it down, recognizing the "_CONFIDENTIAL_" stamp at once. "What?" he muttered to himself. "My blueprints…how did these get on top of the cabinet?" He began to open the folder. "I was certain that they were further back in the—"

It was then with a gasp that he abruptly glanced inside the folder, then let it drop to the floor before rushing over to the phone and, a feeling of anger starting to wash over him, waited impatiently as the phone rang. On the third ring, someone picked it up.

"Hello, Motherboard Control Central, how may I help you?"

The voice was Digit's; there was no mistaking it. Hacker growled under his breath, then snapped at the bird on the other end: "Hello, _Digit_. You can help me by getting off your lazy tail and getting me Dr. Marbles! At _once_!"

There was a brief pause on the other line. "You're kidding, right? Why do you suddenly think that on your command I'd just drop the phone and run to get Dr. Marbles?"

"Because it's urgent!" Hacker shouted back into the line. "Bah! Never mind. Just get me Dr. Marbles before any more trouble persists!"

Needless to say, these words struck Digit's inner curiosity, and for a few moments he looked at the receiver, unable to speak, as if considering. Finally, he looked straight ahead, then, almost as if in a daze, set the phone down and ran over to the other room; on the other end of the line Hacker could hear his descending footsteps. He drummed his fingers on the table impatiently, looking over toward one of the green-tinted glass windows, before the line was finally picked up.

"What do you want, Hacker?"

Now that Hacker was certain that the Doctor was on the other end, he leaned against the table and said, "Nothing much, Marbles. I just want to know where in cyberspace my _confidential blueprints_ are, thank you very much."

There was a pause. "What are you talking about?"

"You know very well what I'm talking about, Marbles," Hacker replied, still sounding eerily calm yet ready to boil over from this faltered conversation. "The blueprints I used to design Buzz, Delete, and that confounded cyberturkey of yours. I recently found the folder that they were kept in, and it appears that they've been stolen."

"Then why do you suddenly blame _me_!"

"Because, you bothersome bubble-head, you were the only one who even knew a bit about my blueprints. I showed you the blueprinted material I used to design Digit with, and the folder as well, and somehow you've always known where I keep my materials. My theory is that you figured I'd make a few more pairs of henchmen, thus you ordered either Digit or one of those Earth brats to come in while I least expected it and swipe them from me, is that correct?"

"No, it's not," Dr. Marbles said, rather hotly. "Even though I detest your ideas, Hacker, I wouldn't go so low as to steal your original materials." He paused, suddenly remembering those two Delete counterparts that had tried to attack them. Even though he didn't want to, he had to know. "Wait. Tell me, Hacker…is there anyone else who knew that you designed the three from blueprints _besides_ myself?"

There was another pause, then the green man finally replied, "Well…as a matter of fact, there actually was. I recently attended a convention about a month ago and…well, I told someone at a booth that their designs were top-secret. He must've wanted them worse than it appeared for some reason…"

"Much worse than it appeared," Dr. Marbles replied.

"What?" Hacker suddenly sounded suspicious. "Are you meaning to tell me that you know about the individual who robbed me of my materials?"

"Well, no…but, to be honest, Mr. Vander Rom—"

"That annoying reporter?"

"Well…yes, if that's the way you want to refer to him. Resuming, he came to Control Central…yesterday, I presume, and said that something had attacked him. He had even taken pictures of the creature, and…"

"And what?"

"And…I know that this sounds rather preposterous, but the creature looked almost exactly like Buzz."

"'Almost exactly'? What in cyberspace do you mean by 'almost exactly'?"

"What I mean is that it had the build of your henchman, but its coloring was entirely different. This one was black, or so it seemed in the photograph…and by the story Vander Rom told it sounded incredibly _violent_. I'm quite sure that it would've killed him, had it had the chance."

Hacker was about to speak, but Dr. Marbles wasn't yet finished. "Thus, Digit and I decided to go to the area where Mr. Vander Rom had been attacked to investigate. The creature appeared to be missing at the moment, and the area was entirely barren, but I did manage to find an old disc in a pile of slightly burnt materials. That was when I was attacked by two other creatures…they looked almost exactly like Delete, excepting, of course, for their coloring and attitudes. The two also had oddly grotesque features."

There was a stunned silence for a moment, then Hacker finally replied, sounding a bit less annoyed than he had been before, "Oh, dear Lord…"

"My sentiments exactly," Dr. Marbles replied, slightly vexed to actually have to agree with Hacker for once. "I normally don't ask you for anything, but this appears much more serious than—"

"You darn well bet!" Hacker snapped into the other line. "Not meaning to add this, but Buzz and Delete have recently been jailed for blowing apart a steel wall, and now they expect _me_ to get them out of trouble! Those blasted bolt-buckets don't know a thing about law and order, if you ask me." Dr. Marbles shifted his gaze away from the phone and made no reply. "I figure that this ties in with that imbecile of a scientist thieving my blueprints. Buzz and Delete _cannot_ blow apart a steel wall, let alone leave a hole that big…"

Dr. Marbles paused again, then looked away from the phone, this time not for the reason of not answering, but deep in thought. Those robotic counterparts were probably the ones that had blown open the wall; if they had been inhumanely strong, he couldn't see why they couldn't be just as fast. After all, he thought, he hadn't even seen the two Delete creatures until it was too late to do anything. And now they were actually causing destruction to other cybersites…they needed to be stopped immediately, but how?

Then the answer suddenly hit him. Rather excited, now, he said into the phone, "Hacker, normally I wouldn't do this, but in such a situation I must make an exception. I have a theory, and I must explain it to you in person. Would you be so—" He halted himself before he could say the word "kind", it would surely offend the villain—"Um…would you be so…" He smacked his head, he couldn't say "helpful" either. Finally, he simply said, "Listen, just come over to Control Central—and _no_ funny business. I'll explain everything once you arrive."

There was a rather long pause at the end of the line. "Alright," he finally said, rather reluctantly. "Just don't count on this to be a hobby of mine or anything."

Dr. Marbles smiled with relief, then nodded, although he knew that Hacker couldn't see him over the phone. "I'm glad that you saw things my way," he said, before quickly hanging up the phone and whirling around to face Digit, who was just coming in from the kitchen.

"Digit!" the Doctor exclaimed. "I need you to do something."

* * *

Meanwhile, with it being late evening and all, the kids of the Cybersquad were all over at Inez's house; she had invited them there earlier for a sleepover. Matt and Jackie were now sitting on sleeping bags on the floor—Matt was wearing faded green pajamas, Jackie a gold-colored flannel nightgown—while Inez was sitting atop her bed, wearing pink, star-patterned pajamas, and holding a remote in one hand. A bowl of popcorn was on the floor between the two eleven-year-olds, and a small television had been brought up to the girl's room and plugged into a nearby socket.

"So, guys," Inez said, flopping back down on the bed, "we've finally got the television hooked up. What do you want to watch first?"

"I heard that they're showing a rerun of last night's baseball game on the sports channel," Matt informed the girl, grabbing a handful of popcorn and stuffing it into his mouth. "I want to watch that. I missed last night's game anyway."

"No way," Jackie objected, holding up her hand. "If we're all going to watch the same thing, we might as well watch something we'd all enjoy…hey, I know! Why don't we watch the home and garden network? I heard that they're giving out tips on how to design stylish new rooms on tonight's show."

"You've _got _to be kidding," Matt scoffed. He took up another handful of popcorn. "What fun is watching someone design a room? Now, watching someone hit a ball out of the park—_that's_ what I'd like to see right now."

"But _I_ want to watch the Antiques Roadshow," Inez objected. "And I'm the one with the remote, so I suppose that I should get to choose right now."

"Hey, that's not fair!" Matt exclaimed, standing up and placing his hands on his hips. "I want to watch the baseball game first! They're not showing another rerun of the game again, and I've never missed a game before in my _life_!"

"There's a first time for everything," Inez replied, grinning. "Besides, _I've_ got the remote, not you, _Matthew_."

A mischievous grin then flickered across Matt's face, and he picked up his pillow from the floor. "Well, then…I suppose that I'll just have to _take it from you_!"

"Eeek! Don't!" Inez laughed, shielding her head with her hands, but Matt had already whacked her with the pillow. Grinning, she picked up her pillow from the head of her bed and said, "so, that's the way you want to fight, huh? Well, then, I always say to fight fire with f ire!" She then whacked Matt on the head with her pillow, causing him to let out a yelp of shock and almost drop his.

Jackie rolled her eyes. "You guys are so weird," she sighed, shaking her head. "At least I'm not getting thrown into any pillow—AAAH! Matt!"

"Now you are!" Matt exclaimed jokingly as he whacked Jackie with the pillow.

Jackie glared at him, but before she could hit him back the image on the television screen flickered, then Motherboard's image appeared. At seeing her, all three kids halted what they had been doing and stopped to stare at her.

"What's going on, Mother B?" Jackie asked.

"Dr. Marbles—new idea. Come—at once. Must—hear explanation."

"We'll be right there," Inez promised. She then looked down at what she was currently wearing and said, rather sheepishly, "but, uh, could you please give us a little bit of time to change into some more appropriate clothing?"

"Very well. But please—hurry."

"Well, I suppose I'll be missing my baseball game anyway," Matt sighed as he ran into a nearby closet with his sweater and jeans. "I'm just wondering why Hacker would attack so late at night…"

"Uh…Matt, it's only 7:30," Inez informed him, pointing to the clock on her wall.

"Oh, whatever!" Matt snapped back from inside the closet. "Either way, it's been awhile since someone actually called us in. What's going on, anyway?"

"You'll—see," Motherboard simply replied.

* * *

"Listen, boys, we've been here for hours, and you still haven't been talking," the officer seated at the table opposite Buzz and Delete said, rather calmly. "We promise that if you tell us the truth, we won't do anything drastic. Now just tell us what we need to know."

"But officer, we _are_ telling 'da truth," Buzz replied. "We didn't do anything."

"Yeah, what he said!" Delete whimpered, pointing at Buzz. "W-we can't blow apart a w-wall! We don't have the experience or the 'splosives."

The officer was silent again. "Listen, I suggest that you just admit your defeat. You've come up with the zaniest excuses in the time that you've been here—heck, once or twice you've claimed that it wasn't you and just two other extremely powerful robots that looked exactly like you. I don't buy it, and neither do the other officers."

"But it's true!" Buzz exclaimed, slamming the palms of his hands down on the table and causing it to vibrate slightly. "I promised youse guys hours ago 'dat I would tell 'da truth and nothing but 'da truth. Geez, how stupid _are_ you people—"

"Talk like _that_ gets you extra hours," the officer snapped, pointing at Buzz. "Sit down. I'm going to get the truth out of you two even if it takes me all night—"

"Officer! How are you this evening?"

The officer was nearly startled out of his seat as the door banged open, and in its place stood a tall man with a brown suit and a mustache. A suitcase was in one hand; the other held a rather drab cigar. Buzz and Delete looked at him, then exchanged glances as the man slowly walked over to where they were standing, stopping behind them.

"And who are you?" the officer said, folding his hands on the table and raising an eyebrow.

"Why, don't you know me at all? I'm their rightfully hired lawyer," he explained, clapping his large hands down on their shoulders and starling them as well. "I was hired to defend them, and defend them I will. As a matter of fact, I won't _stop_ defending until they're freed."

"I'm willing to put up with that," the officer said. "Although this is _not_ a court case, I suppose that it'll have to do…these two can't defend themselves for trash." Buzz glared at him angrily. "Now, please explain your defense."

"Gladly." The man then tossed the suitcase onto the table, cracked his knuckles, and opened it, taking out a single silver disc. "This," he said, holding it up in front of the officer's face, "is a tape of what exactly happened a few hours ago in that vault. Courtesy of the world-wide Cybercouncil, of course." He walked over to a nearby computer, then stuck the disc in and allowed it to process.

"It does take a while," he explained to the officer, before finally looking over at the computer screen. "Ah, there it goes, now. Pay close attention to this, if you don't mind, officer."

The officer obeyed, and looked closely at the tape as the scene with the theft of the Crystal played again: the overhead view of the camera saw Delete walking down the hall, then he stopped, backed up against the wall, then Gabriel came into view. The overhead view showed Gabriel halting, then turning over to another creature, then Delete made a break for it. Gabriel swung his head around, then X leapt onto his back and the two bolted out of the scene. The disc then went blank.

"The…uh…security cameras had been disabled after the sudden attack on the wall," he said, rather sheepishly as he tapped his fingers together. "But I think that's enough proof that there were indeed more than just the two of them in the hallway before the wall was blown apart."

The officer nodded. "But that still doesn't prove that it wasn't them that did it."

"Officer, please!" The man then walked over to Buzz and Delete. "These two creatures are in truth loving, caring members of society!" He squeezed them both tightly, lifting them off of their chairs upon doing so. "They would never try to blow apart a wall just for their amusement. They would never hurt a living soul if their lives depended on it!"

Buzz made several muffled noises from under the lawyer's arm, and the man dropped them both back into their seats, gasping for air. The man then patted them both on the head and said, looking back at the officer, "Besides, I have another little something for you to view."

The officer raised an eyebrow again, as the man took yet another disc out of the suitcase and, walking over to the computer, replaced it with the disc currently in the drive. He then allowed it to process before a single image came onto the screen.

The officer's eyes then widened slightly, for the image was one of Gabriel and X, right before they had leapt and blown open the wall. Gabriel was flattened to the ground, and X couldn't be seen very well due to the massive size of the Crystal he was holding, but the officer could clearly see some differences. He looked over at Buzz and Delete, then at the image, then back at Buzz and Delete again before finally shrugging a shoulder.

"Well, what else can I say," he sighed. "There are quite a few differences between them. I'd say something else, but I figure that it would be pointless after seeing how realistic this image actually is…" He waved his hand in Buzz and Delete's direction. "You're free to go, boys. But if I catch you doing anything else, you're going straight into the slammer, defense or not."

"Oh, thank you, sir!" Delete squealed, jumping to his feet. Buzz rolled his eyes, then leapt down from his chair and walked over toward the man; Delete followed, still slightly giddy. The three then walked out, leaving the officer staring at the image and shaking his head in disbelief.

As soon as they had left the building, Buzz finally looked up at the man and said, "You know, I don't mean to insult your authority, sir, but something tells me youse ain't a real lawyer."

The man raised an eyebrow. "And why is that?"

"Well…this may sound weird, but somehow I kind of feel like I already know you for some reason. I don't exactly know why, either, but…"

"Well, you're right." The man laughed slightly. "You do know me, _Buzzie_." He then dropped his cigar and reached one of his hands up toward his face, then placed it atop his head and pulled forcefully. Much to the two robots' surprise, the entire front half snapped open like a doll's, revealing a metal-coated inner control panel. And sitting within the panel, waving at them and grinning almost smugly, was…

"What the—Digit!" Buzz exclaimed in disbelief.


End file.
